PARLIAMENT New Taxes Deterrent To Incentive, Production

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28629, 4 July 1958, Page 10

PARLIAMENT New Taxes Deterrent To Incentive, Production

(New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, July 3. It was no use Opposition members crying for an . w h en they would not tell the country what the National Party’s alternatives to current Labour policy were, said the Minister of Customs (Mr Boord) in the House of Representatives tonight.

In the Budget debate tonight, the main Opposition speaker was Mr D. J. Eyre (North Shore) who said none of the new taxes would increase production or give incentive to do so. History would ■write the last General Election as the most barefaced hoax ever perpetrated.

Earlier Mr J. A. Roy (Opposition, Clutha) said the Opposition was putting up a sham fight. It was prepared for a fight on the hustings “right now” and as goon as the Prime Minister could arrange a General Election. “If you * want to know what we’d do,” he said, answering cries from the Government benches, “go to the country. We will tell the people then.” What had angered the country most of all was the increased petrol tax, said Mr Roy. Mr E. J. Keating (Government. Hastings) said the main reasons for budgeting for increased taxation were to meet the deficit of £3B million in overseas exchange caused by over-importing; the fall in overseas prices for primary

exports; the rebate of 25 per cent, put into the P.A.Y.E. tables and the £lOO income tax rebate; the increase in State capital expenditure to which the Labour Government was committed, and overdue improvements to Social Security benefits. “At no time did the Labour Party say it would grant the £lOO income tax rebate, as well as the 25 per cent, rebate,” said Mr Keating. “There is nothing

in the Labour Party’s policy to justify the contention. It was said many times that the £lOO w’as in substitution for the 25 per cent, rebate. The Prime Minister said so in my own electorate when the question was raised.”

There was not the slightest ground for asserting that both had been promised. In fact, it was not practical. But the taxpayers had had both for the first six months of this financial year. The present Minister of Finance had to make up in the last six months tax given away by the former Minister in the first six months, said Mr Keating. Mr Eyre said Labour had no mandate, but it did have a majority of two and a half people in every 100 but he was sure more than that proportion would be pleased to see Labour out of office.

Labour supporters would not be the happier for paying an extra 3d for a glass of beer, an extra 6d for cigarettes and an extra Is for petrol. The Government could “explain, wriggle and excuse” itself, but the people would never believe they had not been “taken for a ride.”

It would be a generation before the Labour Party could live down its promises and actions. No good word had been said about the Budget and no-one, after hearing l abour’s election pledges expected the Budget to be so “vicious, savage and severe.” It was the usual socialist policy of “bread and dripping.” Motor-vehicles and transport were to cost more, and companies had been put into the straitjacket of taxation. Mr Boord said the Budget was a courageous one because it showed that the Government was determined to maintain the purchasing power of the family and the farmers. Where possible. Government expenditure was being curtailed, but at the same time provision had to be made for development and much essential work.

Mr Boord said the Opposition’s silence was eloquent on alternatives to present policy. How would the Opposition offset the loss of income from fewer imports, and from lower prices for exports? It was no use the Opposition crying for an election without telling the people what they proposed to do. In fact, the Opposition had no answer to the problems of today. Mr C. G. E. Harker (Opposition, Hawke’s Bay): Accept the challenge, and see if there are any answers.