CITY COUNCIL RATES.

Press, Volume LXIX, Issue 20828, 11 April 1933, Page 15

CITY COUNCIL RATES.

TO THK EDITOE Off TJtt PXIE3S. | ( Sir, —While thanking Mr McCombs i for his reply I cannot help expressing my regret that he betrayed such a strong inclination to evade rather than lace the real issue, viz., the heavy burden of taxation in this city. In order to camouflage the position he divides the fixed charges from the general rate. The ratepayers are not concerned under what heading the rates are collected. It is the total that interests them. The general rate could be reduced to vanishing point if we persisted in borrowing as we did, thereby increasing the fixed charges. I think Mr McCombs is in error when he states that the Wellington Council had to increase their rates. As a matter of fact they were reduced, at any rate they, were lower than ours, and as the same system of rating, unimproved values, is in force there, a fair comparison could be made with this city. Our general rates are 2,', din the £, compared with a rate of 2 13-200 in Wellington, a difference of 37-200 In their favour. In passing, may I point out that he also errs in his statement that Dunedin rates on the capital values. His statement that, "We promised to reduce and did reduce" requires some explanation in the face of his own admission previously, that the amount collected by the council on its behalf in the year 1931-32 was £205,000, compared with £206,000 the following year, an increase of £IOOO. It is significant that he made no comment on the reduction of £55,000 in two years in Dunedin. A similar reduction here would have increased the spending power of the ratepayers by that amount, and circulated by them among the tradesmen would do more good than by pouring it into the council coffers for the purpose of buttressing up a privileged class. 1 Whatever rny knowledge of tramway finance may be, it was at least sufficient to clarify a statement that was very obscure, and to give the ratepayers an insight into the actual position of tramway finance. —Yours, etc., R. B. DALLEY. April 10, 1933.