A PUBLIC WORKS LOAN.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 3, 4 January 1941, Page 6

A PUBLIC WORKS LOAN.

New Zealand, we are told, is making an all-in effort to win the war, and Ministers have assured us with the utmost emphasis that they are. straining every effort to assure victory. Yet the Minister for Finance announces the issue of a new Public Works loan, for an unstated amount, and for purposes which are very lightly sketched in. Money must continue to circulate in the Dominion, and works upon which the Dominion depends must go on. But every item of expenditure should be linked up with the war effort, and it is the Government's first duty to see that this is accomplished. Some of the announced objects are thus directed, and some of them are essential to general progress, but a budget which allocates only one-third of its total expenditure for war services apart from the maintenance of the forces overseas, gives no assurance that the best use is being made of the vast sums collected by to-day's multitudinous and mounting taxes. The inclusion of railways, more public buildings, when ruinously extravagant piles are already being erected, and telephone services, for instance, will not satisfy those w&o

demand that a real "all-in" effort be] made. There will thus be a hesitancy in the public mind, increased by what might be regarded as a lack of frankness by the Minister. He may not yet know what his war commitments will be in the coming year, but the current financial year has only three months to run, and by then he should be able to form a reasonably reliable estimate. On the basis of this he should state, with whatever definiteness he can, whether this development loan will be followed by another compulsory loan in a Jew months. Upon this poinfc the warmth of the reception of the present issue will depend. The fact that the leading banks, in granting overdrafts for the payment of the eight million loan, demanded repayment within a year has led to a suspicion that the dose will be repeated. If it will not, then a liberal response to the issue loan will follow, for its terms are favourable, money is awaiting investment, and the people are very ready to lend surplus cash for any purpose connected with the war. Though the connection is far too remote in some of the named objects, funds will be supplied if investors know where they stand with regard to future war issues.