Minister Wants To Abolish Land Tax

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31633, 20 March 1968, Page 14

Minister Wants To Abolish Land Tax

The Minister of Lands (Mr Maclntyre) said last evening that he was hopeful of being able to do something about land taxes this year—“and by this, I mean abolish it.”

He told a meeting

of 100 farmers and others at Rakaia that he had recommended the abolition of land tax to the Minister of Finance (Mr Muldoon).

Mr Maclntyre, who is making a two-day fact-finding tour of the Selwyn electorate at the invitation of its member (Mr C. C. A. McLachlan), was answering a question from the floor.

Mr D. K. Mackenzie, president of Mid-Canterbury pro* vincial district of Federated Farmers, had said that a comprehensive survey had been taken in the district of the level of land tax and that the farming community was getting restive because the Government had appeared to have done nothing on the topic. Objection To Methods Earlier, Mr Maclntyre described the scope of his portfolios in lands and forests and said that as a farmer he had objected to the methods of the Valuation Department

when it assessed land values every five years. When he assumed the portfolio of Minister in charge of the Valuation Department, '.ie said, a review had been carried out in Southland which increased the land assessment by 173 per cent The Minister said 1300 property owners in Southland had objected to the increased valuations in the last review. These were in the process of being “whittled down” and the first five had been dealt with. The Land Valuation Committee had brought down a supplementary report. The cases were the first in which the uninproved value had been tested in court and he was using these as guinea pig cases in his review of land valuation, Mr Maclntyre said. He also referred to the Boss Committee which had advocated the abolition of land tax. He had asked the ValuerGeneral for a full review of the valuation of land in New Zealand from its introduction. This had been prepared, and in it, the Valuer-General suggested that in future, rather than having the “unimproved

factor” which farmers felt hard to understand it would be better to base values on what could be loosely described as “fight value.” Mr Maclntyre said he had set up a committee known as the Beattie Committee with the particular task Of assessing the impact of unimproved value as it affected the Crown as lessee and as lessor of land. “I believe that if the Minister of Finance is able to abolish land tax, I can produce a system of land valuation which farmers will understand,” said the Minister. The meeting last evening was sponsored by the Selwyn electorate of the National Party and local Federated Farmers members were invited.