The Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. MONDAY, JUNE 14, 1909.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume XXIX, Issue 7821, 14 June 1909, Page 2

The Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. MONDAY, JUNE 14, 1909.

Ih New Zealand some The years ago, when at Unearned least some of the pubInckisment. lio men of the day were philosophers or students of first principles, much was heard about the unearned increment, which John Stuart Mill held should be taxed, if not appropriated, by the State as a percentage of value which was created not by the individual owners of property, but the public. It should not be without interest to New Zealanders to know that it is part of the present British Government's policy to tax this percentage of value. ■" It is proposed (said Mr Lloyd George, in introducing his Budget) to levy 11 tax upon the increment value accruing to land from the enterprise of the community or the landowner's neighbour. It is to apply to future appreciation in value only, and will not touch any increment already accrued. The valuations, upon the difference between which the tax will be chargeable, will be valuations of the land itself, apart from buildings and other improvements; and of this difference—the strictly unearned increment—we propose to take one-fifth or 20 per cent, for the State. The landlord will thus be in no way penalised in respect to his own enterprise, while existing . interests will be fully safeguarded, since the original valuation which forms the basis on which the increment is calculated will include not only values which are already realised, but also the anticipation of future appreciation, in so far as that anticipation has already acquired a market value. The charge will hot be levied upon the increment value as it accrues, but upon certain occasions such as transfer sale or the passing of property upon death. Corporations which do not die will pay on property owned by them at stated intervals of years, being allowed the option of spreading the payment of the duty upon the increment accruing in one period over the following period by annual instalments. As the standard of comparison is the value of the land at the present „ date,: the tax will be levied only upon increment subsequently accruing."

The New Zealanb Education Tablet hit the nail and sheer and sharp on the Religion. head when: it said : "Many ■ but few cures are suggested by our Protestant friends for the gwHessness of our system ■■>, of public instruction.-; But the obvious cure is clearly ;too heroic a treatment for their timid "souls and their none too robust religious constitutions. And thus.it befalls that Catholics have a? practical monopoly in the true prophylactic or preventive of the evils of the secular system ; namely, the school in which God holds His rightful place in the life i of the child. We have piped to them, and they have not danced. And they spend the precious years shifting and turning from scheme to scheme and finding 'jjio. rest—tossing idly from side i Ijb side in the prone position that they occupied three and thirty years ago." This somewhat contemptuous statement of the case is not unwarranted by the facts; and, contingently, it agrees with our own view, that the one really satisfactory way to secure the religious education of the young is for every religions body to have its own schools, for these to be open to exami-' nation by the State's inspectors, and for the State to subsidise all schools thus inspected, on the basis of the instruction given by them in secular subjects.