"CUTS" ALL ROUND.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 260, 3 November 1931, Page 5

"CUTS" ALL ROUND.

PUBLIC WORKS ESTIMATES.

REDUCTION OVER £2,000,000.

CURTAILED PROGRAMME

Provision is made in the Public Works Estimates, which were presented in the House of Representatives last night, for the expenditure of £6,135,705 in the current year. The total expenditure under all votes an<l accounts for the year ended March 31 last was £8,388,529.

The expenditure for the period ending on March 31 next represents money from loan funds, and is exclusive of expenditure from the main highways revenue account, which is financed by taxation. The expenditure from this account last year was £1,225,000 and this year it is proposed to spend £1,300,000. The vote for railway construction is £700,000, compared with £1,478,688 expended last year. The sum of was spent last year on railway" improvements and additions to open lines. The vote this year is £1,020,000. On public buildings £924,■254 was spent last year, and the estimate now is £680,600. Tourist resorts absorbed £60,208 last year and provision is made on the estimates for £50,000. Other large votes are as follow, the expenditure last yea# being in parentheses: — Roads and bridges, £1,100,000 ( £1,475,523); telegraphs, £250,000 ( £419,756); irrigation and drainage, £75,000 (£62,614); immigration, £10,000 ( £33,544). The construction fund, apart from the revenue fund of the main highways account, is voted at £540,000, against an expenditure of . £757,906 last year. Railway Works. This year's vote on the new railway station and yard at Wellington is £150,000, the expenditure up to the present having been £540,445. The Tawa Flat deviation has cost £993,300, the current vote being £200,000. Electrification of the Wellington-Paekaka-riki section is estimated to cost £30,000 and the full amount is voted. For the strengthening of bridges £139,000 is voted as part of a programme of ■ £500,000, of which £1,981,529 was spent up to March 31 last. The vote for rolling stock, road motors, workshops, and depot equipment is £714,500. The land improvements vote is £70,000, as against £70,534 spent last year. A sum of £2759 is voted to the Kaihu River drainage works in Northern Wairoa. Last year £10,642 was voted and £7883 spent. For the Kaitaia drainage scheme £6800 is voted, and £1425 £ for £ subsidy for the Ruawai outlet. For work on the Piako River stopbanks £793 is provided. Construction works on the Waihou and Ohinemuri Rivers improvement scheme cost £10,000 last year, and'another £25,000 is now proposed. For survey work in connection with silting of the Waikato River the sum of £900 is on the estimates. Public Buildings. The total vote for public buildings is £680,600, as against £924,254 expended last year. The largest individual vote is for education buildings, the sum of £350,000 being provided for this purpose, as against £501,234 expended last year. Other votes are as follow: Post and telegraph buildings, £140,000 (£138,607); mental hospitals, £90,000 ( £134,140); court-houses, £8000 ( £19,573); health and hospitals, £7000 ( £17,338); police statiops, £8000 ( £5360).

For the Upper Symonds Street post office £7000 is voted, the amount already expended from last year's vote of £14,500 being £7430. The estimated cost of the work was £14,500. For the chief post office at Dunedin, estimated to cost £330,100, the sum of £20,000 is voted. Already £30,160 has been spent. For a post office for Taumarumii £6000 is voted, tenders for the work to be called at an early date. A vote of £2000 for Supreme Court library accommodation at Auckland, unexpended last year, has not been renewed. • Auckland Education. Education buildings in the Auckland district are provided for »to the extent of £32,060, the principal items being: Brixton Road School additions, £1800; Forest Lake additions, £591; Katikati Central, £2321; Kirikopuni, site and building, £1794; Otahuhu, £2469; Otahuhu, additions, £0500? Ruawai additions, £642; and Ruawaro, site and buildings, £600.