PARLIAMENT.

Evening Post, Volume XLVI, Issue 17, 20 July 1893, Page 4

PARLIAMENT.

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES. Yksterdat's Afternoon Sittins. the financial dedate. Mr. DUTHIE said tho Financial Stato tnent was a " huckster's statement," fnll of petty details that were out of place. It did aot bear the imprint of tho Colonial Treasurer's mind. It was full of overlapping tables which made it difficult to follow Opportunities should be offered of direct intercourse with the officers of the Treasury to such members of the Opposition as the Leader might name, in order that they might obtain eluoidation of the figures. The accounts of any business firm would be selfexplanatory, and Bhow exactly the condition of eaoh department, but the accounts of tlu colony did not do this. The Land Fund Aooonnt was a particular example. It was full of items that had no connection with the lands of the colony, such as " efforts to produce rain at Oamaru," bonus on a work on New Zealand flora, and other things, and instead of assistance being criven towards understanding it, oven obstruction was placed in the way of members of the Opposition who endeavoured to understand it. In one place there was a mistake of £20,000, which should bo a warn ing to the Colonial Treasurer not to rely entirely on the figures given him by the department. The Premier, speaking at Napier of the railway surplus, said this was easily got by making a low estimate. As ho said this of the railways, members were justified in saying the same of him. In the ca-ie of the Customs revenue, when the country was sound lost year the Government reduced the Customs estimate by .£50,000. The tinder-estimation was deliberately done to create a surplus. Had it not been so underestimated the country wonld have demanded a reduotion in taxation, and to avoid this, and produce an apparent surplus, the Government underestimated. In the stamp revenue, a similar underestimate hod been made. The railway figures were moat gratifying, as showing the good management of the railways and the condition of the oountry which the railway returns re fiectedf but the Premier received this most ungraciously, and on the first occasion on whioh he sjjoke afterwards—At Napier-he hurled changes at the Commissioners on account of it. In other departments, in which the revenue might have been esti mated with approximate exactitude, there had been similar underestimating with the object of deceiving the pnblio. Dealing with the Pnblio Works Expenditure, the speaker considered the Government was sapping the self-reliance of the poople, and teaching them to lean upon the State The Government boasted of being a non - borrowing Government, but under various Acts they had taken authority to borrow .£372,000 this year. The conversion operations were not understandable from the Statement. So far as known, the conversion might prove very expensive. They were told of reduced interest, and had to accept whatever was told them, but there was an item of conversion to 4 per cent stook in last year's transactions, which investigation did not show aB advantageous. Instead of paying the colony's creditors off out of the sinking fnnd, they were givingthem 36 years' bonds, and it was at least doubtful if it wonld be tq the ultimate profit of the colonies. There was one item of .£29,000 expenses on this transaction of the conversion of 44,214,000, which would seem to show that there were considerable pickings from these transactions. Evening Sittino. Mr. DUTHIE continued his speech Though be had urged on Government to rednce the Customs duties, he did not thiuk in the present state of the finances Govern* ment would be justified in doing so now ; neither did he consider they were justified in taking so Urge a sum from the revenue for the Pnblia Works FunU. Dealing with the Land Policy, he said the majority of people who were applying for land now were town folk, who had no intention of going on the land, and simply entered with a speculative mind, as they invested .£1 on tbe totalisator. It would have been of much greater advantage to settlement to have spent the money devoted to buying runs in the South to surveying and roading Crown lond-i in tha North*. He commented strongly on the London transactions, and, dealing with native land! generally, he condemned the dealings with auch lands by the Liberal Party, referring to such transactions as those in connectioi with the Waimarino blook.for assisting ii the purchase of which the Stout -Voge Government paid .£3284 to an ex-member oi the House, and then a candidate— Mr. J Stevens. The speaker also commented strongly on Bomo aspects of the Cadman Bees case. The Debenture Tax hadprodncec a most uneasy feeling, and he thought it wai probably this that acted detrimentally ii connection with the Napier Harbour Loan and by increasing the difficulty of getting money, indirectly contributed to the bus pension ot the Loan and Mercantile Agenoj Company. The Civil Service was in a stat< of terrorism. He recently called «t thi offioe of one of the Civil Servants, and all thi time ho was there that officer was watching the door in fear that he would be caugh speaking to an Opposition member, whili other omoora, strong in the favonr of Minis tars, were most uncivil to Opposition mem bers. Ministers now took in hand thing) that should have been left to their officers If a Post Office was required at Pahiatuf It took two Ministers to go up and fix th< site, and if a rock had to be blasted at Nel son a Minister had to go over to see about it Referring to the Railway Commissioners, hi said the Premier went about making chargei and misstatements against tbe Railway Com missioners in the hope that he might ge' charge of the railways. Sir ROBERT STOUr strongly condemned Mr. Dnthie for his insinuations concerninf the late Mr. Ballance's administration o native land purobaae. Mr. Dnthie had beei - two sessions in the House while Mr. Ballanci was alive, but had never opened his moutl about it till the late Premier was dead. Hi references to the Cadman case now that Mr Cadman could not defend himself wen also moat ungraoious. He strongly de fended the Grey Government agains the charge of extravagant expenditure quoting tho saving of .£244,000 on thi annual appropriations of 1879. It was onl; the enormous drop in the Land Fund receipt that caused the breakdown of their finance and he blamed the succeeding Governmen for eia.ggen.ting the deficit for purposes o their own. Many of the liabilities had m existence save in the imagination. Thi Grey Government deficit was .£83,000 ; thi Atkinson Government deficit when they lef office in 1884 was The Stout Vogol Government lightened the Propertj lax on taking office, but when they aeke< for an increase of the Customs duties in 18tii they were refused. They should then havi left office, and thrown the responsibility oi those who had refused them the assistanci they required. Then, when they went on' of ofnoe, the Atkinson Government delibe rately deoeived the oountry, and refrainec from increasing taxation until the deficit hat mounted to enormous proportions. Thei they put on orushing taxation and raisec a loan. It was only debentures Bocurec on land which had to pay Id in the £. No thing more was done than under the Pro pertv Tax. If a man lived in this colony h< would pay tax, and it was absurd to tall of exempting a man from the tax simply be cause he lived elsewhere. He disapproved of the exemption of improvements, becaus< he did not consider the finances were ii such a state as to jnßtify it, and in the finan oial state of the world they should dc nothing to weaken their finance. He wai amused to hear* several members denouno' ing this proposed remission this year— thej were the very men who last year voted foi the exemption of improvements in the division on Sir George's Grey's Bill. He disapproved oi the addition to the Graduated Tax He did not believe in the Single Tax. If £ per cent, was considered a fair return from property, the highest graduated scale pint the ordinary Land Tax was 4s 7d in the £ With the additional tax this would be Ss in the .£l, and that was a penal tax. Yet he believed in progressive taxation. Hj denied that small farmers were unfairly treated under the prosenl system of taxation. Ho considered a sinking fund necessary, and tbe best sinking fund would be in the form of reproductive publio works. The Government had contribnted .£430,000 towards the rednotion oi the debt of the colony. On the other hand, what were the proposals of the Opposition i Unfortunately they all proposed different things, but bo far as he could gather they proposed to borrow JJ1,500,000, and to expend .£350,000 on railways, and the rest on roads, whioh would return no interest towards payment of the loan. It was time the Opposition Bottled on some definite platform, as they could not go to the oountry on auoh a platform aa this. The question of the future was that of local taxation. The oountry oould not go on making roads and publio works out of revenne. They should set aside some permanent endowment for local bodies— Bay one million aores of land, to be let on perpetual lease withont the the power of purchase, the ' proceeds to go towards assisting local bodies, those in outlying districts where roads required to be made to receive twice as much subsidy as tnoso in settled districts, nre the roads were made. He regretted the perpetual lease had been destroyed by subsequent legislation. Tho State should retain control ovtfr its hind, as many Continental States still had. The* people would yet regret their clamour for the freehold. As to the railways, he considered the Finanoial Statement did not go far enough. The Stato should take entire control of its railways. In the United States the State was actually interfering in the oontrol of private railways. He contended that if the State did not control its own railways it should not construct them. The system of Boards of Control had been tried elsewhere, and failed. Members objeoted to the Cheviot purchase ; yet that purchase was in aooordance with a provision of the law whioh had been in «xistenoe for years, and which was taken from an Amerioan Aot. It used to be provided that where an estate was valued too low it was to be taken over at tho valuation plus 10 per cent. The 10 per cent, had now been done away with. If the Cheviot estate, with £46,000 between the valuations, had not been taken over, the provisions of the Aot might as well have been wiped out. Aa towelling » third for oash, it was necessary to do so for purpose's of finance. He admitted that the Liberals of to-day were different from those of 50, 30, or even 10 years ago. They were developing and changing, as conditions changed and developed. The old Liberal* did much for individual liberty, but the people had now learned to trust in the State, and individualism was merged in the effort to try and lift humanity as a whole to a higher life. The spirit of the age was Socialistic, and those who proposed the abolition of Party' were proposing advance towards the commnnistio idea, but if they were sincere in their desire to do away with Party Government let them rise above Parly and consider measures in that light. They S°"-f'" l *lS"" llt "° d "lore pay to their to'Z xLtJPI^'K* 0 * *° b^ servant" totne State, both in its greater and leaser officers They must do all they oeuld to secure the purity, physical and moral, of the wee. After an eloquent peroration, Sir Robert oonoluded at 10.20 p.'mT, amidst unioined * PP ' * ° h 9y<m th 9 fwU ' 3rle * 1

Captain RUSSELL, who was rooeived vith upplauso, Baid ho was not aware tbut in uaaoxpeotad to follow Sir Robert, and .iad not taken notea. He criticised Sir Robert's speech aB a splendid effort, and one Inch it had boen a pleasure to hoar. He onngratulated tho House on the addition of the Hon. Mr. Montgomery to the Cabinet. He would undoubtedly strengthen the Ministry. Most of tho speakers had complimented the Colonial Treasurer on his Budget. Members ot his Party frequently thought he was too kind to the Government, but he must differ trom them again, as he could not compliment Mr. Ward on Mb Statement. It seemed to oontain a little of everything bnt finance. After the supper adjournment, Captain RUSSELL continued that Sir Robert had put the case against the control of the railways by tho Commissioner!. He had claimed that the Commissioners were an irresponsible body, but they were not bo. They hold their office so long only as thdj> did their business to the satisfaction of Parliament, and could be dismissed from office whenever they failed to give satisfaction. A Minister for Public Workß would not be bo dependent A Minister of strong will would dominate the Board if given a seat on it, and if the railways were given to a Minister who had a strong majority he could play duoks and drakes with it for all the House could do. But as a Minister oould not devote the time necessary, under a Minister the Railways were virtually in the hands of a manager. The moat important olement to success in railway management was continuity. Yet in the 25 years since tbe inauguration of the Publio Works policy there had been 12 Ministers of Publio Works These were a farmer, a journalist, an auctioneer, an engineer, some merchants, a politician, a contractor, and the present Premier. None of these men had any knowledge of railway management when they went into offioe, and they knew no more ol it when they went out of offioe. The rule of tbe Commissioners was certain to be more beneficial to the staff than to be under political control, when they wonld be subject to reduotion with every wave of depression. The Commissioners, while improving the rolling stock and permanent way, had yet raised the returns from the railways from £Z 6s per centum to over £3 per oentnm. Treating of the general finance, Captain Russell said that if the Estimates were oorrect it was unjustifiable to maintain the presentrtaxation. Last year ha opposed the exemption of improvements, and he opposed it still, as he believed it was a practical impossibility to ascertain the unimproved value ot improved land. The amount of taxation on land was not known, as in addition to the Is in the £ of Land Tax and the Graduated Tax the settler had to pay a Road Board tax a County Tax, a Sheep Tax, a Babbit Tax, and perhaps a Cattle Tax. If, as Sir Robert hod said, the Government taxation amounted to 4s 7d in the £, this was only half of the taxation to which the oountry settler was liable, so when they doubled that sum they would see the oruihing impost on the owner of a Urge estate bringing in a small inooms. Tbe whole tendency was so muoh to tax the country and save the town that there was no spirit of equity in it, and it seemed as if au effort was being made to tax out of existenoe the farming industry, the most valuable industry in the colony. Improvements in boroughs amounted to half the value, while in thn country they only amounted to one-third, so that the differeno* in the treatment of town and country would be aocentuated by exemption of improvements. It was impossible to say what was improved valne. Take the Wellington reclamation. In its unimproved condition it might have been of the valne of Ihf sma'lest coin of the realm as a fishing ground. Where the Government Printing Office stood was land wholly made by man on one side of the street and made by Nature on the other. Yet the unimproved valne of both was put down at the same. In Hawkes Bay he knew a piece of land so poor that it half-starved 1500 sheep, and would pay interest on nothing. By dint of pouting in capital it was now made to carry ten sheep well where it had starved one before ; yet its unimproved value was set down at .£lO an acre. The swamp on the left bank of the Manawatu River, on the Manawatu line, was valn«l at 5s per acre. On the other side was what hod been a similar swamp, yet hod been made, by the expenditure of capital, into some of theriohest land in New Zealand. That land was valued at unimproved value of £5 per acre, though before taken in hand it had been the same as the rest of the swamp. The only common sense and practicable value was tha value to sell He might say he was arguing against his own as under tbe proposed exemption ho would be a considerable gainer. The exemption of improvements was unscientifiq, in that it relieved tbe old and well-eßtablißhed settler, and taxed the struggling new settler. The new settler's land was practically valued at its value to soil, and that at a time when he wanted all his capital, while the prosperous old settler, well able to pay, had no more taxation to pay. This was oertainly unscientific. A few years hence the improvements of the clearing of bush and levelling of country wonld be exhausted, and the only improvements recognised for exemption wonld be growing crops and houses. In the town, on the contrary, the buildings would be a standing monument for exemption. To produce equality of taxation let them adopt a Bystem of taxation akin to that of the local bodies, and exempt no property whatever. The graduated taxation should begin lower down, instead of being confined to a few. At present taxation weighed upon the two extremes of society, through the Customs duties and the Graduated Tax By more widely distributing it over the middle section, taxation might be very largely relieved both as to the Customs and Graduated Tax, and thus produce eqnality of saorifioe. Mr. MEREDITH followed at 11.50 p.m., strongly condemning' the personality of remarks made on Monday by Mr. Scobie Mackenzie. He approved all the Government polioy, and closed at 1.15 a.m. The debate was adjournod on the motion of Mr. Allen, and the Honse rose at 1.17 a.m.