"SIMPLE JUSTICE."

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 193, 17 August 1939, Page 10

"SIMPLE JUSTICE."

A confusion of thought is involved in Mr. J. A. C. Allum's statement that it is a matter of "simple justice" that the Transport Board should be immediately relieved of rates totalling £3000 on the 44 miles of its track which run through the rated boroughs. Questions of taxation like this, if they are considered apart from existing practicc, seldom involve any moral principle at all. It would take a Solomon to decide, on considerations of "justice" alone, whether the Transport Board should pay rates on the tram tracks; the fact is that the matter cannot be decided on purely theoretical grounds. A weighty practical consideration, on the other hand, can be used to support the argument that the board ought to be rated —that no arbitrary change ought to be made in the incidence of rating unless for very good reason. If the board is to be exempted from payment the local bodies will have to find the lost revenue somewhere, and they can do so only by raising their rates., The ratepayer, in a word, will have to find the sum that the traveller now pays. But the ratepayer has purchased his property on the assumption that the existing method of rating will continue. Is it "simple justice" to him to alter this state of affairsf If the board has to meet rising costs, so also have the local authorities. It should not expect to pass the increased costs on to them. There is another aspect. If the Transport Board is entitled to exemption from rates, why not the Power Board! If the Power Board, can the Gas Company be excluded on any consideration of "justice"? If all these exemptions were conceded the extra burden passed on to the individual ratepayer would be considerable.