Tax take reduces deficit

Press, 12 April 1984, Page 1

Tax take reduces deficit

Parliamentary reporter A higher tax take has reduced the internal deficit almost ?2 million from its forecast level, and allowed the Government to make a down payment on its supplementary minimum prices bill due next year.

The final tax take from the last financial year was $7477 million, said the Prime Minister, Sir Robert

Muldoon, yesterday. Depending on what the Government had spent in the last year, the internal deficit would have been about $2.9 billion. The Government last year budgeted for a $3.2 billion deficit. The Government had taken advantage of the extra tax take and repaid “a good slice” of the S.M.P.S to the Reserve Bank, Sir

Robert said. The Government has the option at the end of the year of repaying some of the S.M.P. bill due in the next year’ arid the Government has evidently taken advantage of cash it had not expected to repay some of this debt. Sir Robert said the final deficit looked as though it would be over $3 billion

after this adjustment. “The deficit has been financed in an orthodox fashion, and there wasn’t any shortage of cash at the end of the year,” he said. The down payment on the S.M.P. bill is expected to reduce the provision for S.M.P.S in this year’s Budget, thus reducing their contribution to the 1984-85 deficit.