No mini-Budget expected

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32966, 12 July 1972, Page 3

No mini-Budget expected

'.\<ir Zealand Press Association WELLINGTON. July 11. A mini-Budget after the election is unlikely because by that time there will have been only a small net shift in financial advantage from the public sector to the private sector, according to the research director of the Bankers' Association (Mr \V. A. Poole).

Modest control of Government spending until that time would remove the need for a mini-Budget, Mr Poole said tonight. The Budgets of 1970 and 1971 were unnecessarily tough, and cost at least a year’s economic growth. The 1972 Budget merely redressed the position. [ The size, if not the exact [shape of the Budget’s meaIsures, was about right. Mr [ Poole said. I Work by a Reserve Bank 'economist apparently indi-

cated that the Budget would produce only a small net increase in purchasing power, with which a slack economy with record external reserves could easily cope “Not only did the Government have a very considerable scope for generosity, but large adjustments to revenue and expenditure were essential to get back on a path of economic growth avoiding our recent stagnation.” Few of the critics of this “generosity” had mentioned [control of State spending this [year, which was remarkable, said Mr Poole. Provided Government expenditure was kept under control at Budget level, this year’s estimated s2l3m deficit could be halved by errors in forecasting revenue—“if this year’s forecasts of revenue are no more accurate than last year's.”