ISLAND ACCOUNTS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 36, 12 February 1931, Page 7

ISLAND ACCOUNTS.

NEW ZEALAND'S BURDEN. REDUCTIONS CONSIDERED. ASSURANCE BY MR. FORBES.' . Replying to the Auckland Chamber of Commerce on the subject of the Administration accounts in New Zealand's Pacific Islands dependencies, the Prime Minister, the Right Hon. G. W. Forbes, gave an assurance that the Government was studying cost reduction. The manner in which revenue and expenditure on accounts in the dependencies were shown in official statements were statutory, and could not be varied without legislative amendments. In earlier correspondence, the chamber pointed out that, from the Cook Islands Report, it would appear that there was a surplus in 1929 on account of the Administration of £3311. By reefi;enee to the Consolidated Fund accounts; the apparent profit became -a deficit of about £31,000, excluding the cost of repairs and alterations to the Maui Pomare. Similarly, an apparent profit of £20,136 in the administration of Western Samoa became a loss of some £5000. The chamber suggested presentation of the accounts in a manner revealing to the public ~tlie true burden of the Island dependencies. In his letter Mr. Forbes said that to add -£29,448 as the total estimated cost, of the Samoan Administration for the year ending March 31, 1931, to the total Samoan estimates would be misleading. The former was a charge on the New Zealand Treasury. . . The chamber referred the question of a reply to a special committee.