The Press TUESDAY, APRIL 2, 1935. The British Financial Year

Press, Volume LXXI, Issue 21438, 2 April 1935, Page 10

The Press TUESDAY, APRIL 2, 1935. The British Financial Year

The revenue and expenditure figures for the British financial year which ended on March 31, given in some detail in " The Press" this morning, are encouraging because they seem to justify further tax reductions and also because they offer definite evidence of a revival in trade and industry. The item which has upset the Chancellor of he Exchequer's estimate in his 1933-34 budget of a revenue surplus of less than £ 1,000,000 is income tax. The income tax collected for the first nine months of 1934-35, which about equalled the estimate for the period, had been assessed on 19323 incomes. The income tax collected for the last quarter was assessed on 1933-34 incomes; and it i in this quarter that the increase has occurred. The official estimate was based on the assumption that incomes in 1933-34 would lot exceed incomes in the previous year, so that the inference must be that during "1933-34 there was a substantial measure of recovery in Great Britain. Whether or not the surplus at the Chancellor's disposal will be a. large as the revenue and expendii ture figures seem to indicate is doubtful. The "Economic" points out that an item of £1,250,000 advanced to the cattle industry and another of £1,773,000 advanced as shipping subsidies have been regarded by the Treasury as temporary advances and excluded from expenditure. To regard these amounts as recoverable seems unjustifiably optimistic. Moreover, the heavy increases in expenditure on armaments announced in the White Paper make it unlikely that taxpayers will receive any very substantial benefit from the unexpected surplus. There is one aspect of the British Treasury returns we have referred to in past years and make no apology for referring to again. It is that on the day the financial year ends the British public knows by how much revenue and expenditure have exceeded or fallen short of the estimates and that usually within three weeks of the end of the financial year the Chancellor brings down his budget. In New Zealand ' it is usual for a detailed statement of revenue and expenditure to be made not less than three months after the end of the financial year and for the budget to be presented a month or more later. In. 1933, indeed, the budget was not presented until eight months after the end of the financial year. The disadvantages of this' delay are obvious. It puts Parliament in the undignified position of having to vote estimates which are already at least a third expended; it means that informed criticism of the Government's finan- [ cial programme becomes possible only when it is too late to have any effect; and it deprives citizens of the early knowledge of their probable tax burden to which they I are entitled. It has been argued by ; the Prime Minister and by the j Treasury that the New Zealand sys- | tern of public accounting makes the early presentation of the budget and of figures for revenue and expenditure impossible. It is true that the New Zealand system of public accounting is more complicated than the British by reason of the introduction of commercial accounts supplementary to the statutory public accounts; and the commercial accounts are worth persevering with even at the cost of some inconvenience. On the other hand i the Auditor-General, in his last report, shows that the budget can be produced earlier if the Government and the Treasury really v/ant it to be produced earlier. For one thing, transfers and transactions which could be dealt with earlier in the year are held over by the departments until near, or after, the end of the year. " The consequent rush " of work in the Treasury and the " Audit Department at the end of " the year," says the Auditor-Gen-eral, " causes a delay which could " largely be avoided by more timely " action on the part of other depart- " ments." It seems beyond doubt that an earlier budget would not necessarily have any harmful effect on the efficiency of public accounting. Possibly some increase in expenditure on staffing would be necessary; but the money would be well spent.