DEATH DUTIES

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 177, 28 July 1944, Page 2

DEATH DUTIES

AMENDMENT TO ACT"::

PILLING UP A "HOLE"

(By Telegraph.—Parliamentary Report#.) | WELLINGTON, this EA technical amendment _of tte: Death Duties Act, which is ind®; in the Finance Bill now before ra-'; liament, has an interesting origuM The Minister of Finance, Mr. «, said in the House of Repress® tives yesterday that it re P e^ le r r j I sub-clause in the original Act was made retrospective from J 3 d -' ar.y. 1942. J The original legislation was pas*K as the result of difficulties dum, the slump following the last and provided that debts which forgiven could not be subjectefl: M gift duty. he.said. Some clever B yer found out that this could agte to a company, as a company coh not be said to be related to MfY-i son by ties of blood or ro arr „p ! therefore if it made a gift those conditions it was not lia DK (1 !; i gift duty. Some people were on»-: opinion that if a lawyer fo u P°r? v in an Act and got through;it tnehof the Government was to let get tuvay with it, and then fin the^iole. "I don't agree with that. [

„inued Mr. Nash. "I instructed Commissioner of Stamps to say we would not agree to an a®V" ment of the Act being used in way, and to make sure that it »u * not be used in future we are ro ing this amendment, which is spective to 1942."

"Spoke Like Dictator" Criticising this clause later, Algie (National. Remuera) .saw .• had often heard the Minister Finance referred to as a dicw and if the Minister was going w ■ what he would allow and WQUiQ.. allow citizens to do he was very close to that reputation. & zen was fully entitled to take au tage of the law as he found it ¥ j. : : kept within the law. When ats • were done within the law it X ; British justice to go back over acts of citizens and rend ? r a( ,rjl)fillegal retrospectively. He o e »s the clause as having been introu to suit the whim of a Mirnsw § Finance who spoke like a dicta