PAYING FOR ARMAMENTS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 130, 3 June 1937, Page 6

PAYING FOR ARMAMENTS.

Never before has a Chancellor of the Exchequer been called upon to recall a new tax involving the collection of twenty millions, and perhaps, as the London "Daily TelegTaph" says, Mr. Neville Chamberlain, in withdrawing the graduated tax on growing profits, has performed an act of high courage. But if he has, the laugh is still on his side, for he has discovered another means of collecting the defence contribution which will bring an extra five millions of grist to the mill. The method of imposing the tax was apparently more objectionable than the tax itself. It left the heads of companies in so much doubt as to what they would have to pay that it was impossible to discover the depth of the financial morass into which they were likely to be led, while the compilation of the necessary figures would have choked the accountancy departments and disorganised business. The protest was so universal that Mr. Chamberlain gave way, and it says much for the genuineness of the opposition that withdrawal was welcome even at the price of a 25 per cent increase. Britain is ready to pay the price of security, but the business community demands some form of anaesthetic when the teeth are being extracted.