NO TAX REDUCTIONS

Evening Star, Issue 19634, 13 August 1927, Page 11

NO TAX REDUCTIONS

DISAPPOINTED REFORM MEMBER [From Ook Pakliamentaet i.’EJ'C rtee,] "WELLINGTON, August 12. Remarking that caution was somewhat akin to pessimism, Mr Harris expressed the opinion that the Minister of Finance might have been less cautious, and have put heart into the people by making some reduction in taxation. The Government, ho said, was pledged to progressive reductions in taxation, yet two sessions of the three which constituted the life of the present Parliament had passed without any reduction. Mr Harris wanted to call attention to the Minister’s surplus of £587,142. “That was fortuitous,” interjected the Hon W. D Stewart. “Yes, the Minister says it was fortuitous,” retorted Mr Harris, “ but that really means that the people of New Zealand paid that much more in indirect taxation .than the Minister thought they would pay.” Actually, the position was that £130,000 less than the previous year had been collected, and the Minister used that as an excuse for not reducing the burden of taxation. Personally, Mr Harris thought that a double argument for reduction. He believed that a. bold reduction would have done more than anything else to restore optimism, and confidence, and to put heart into the people. A Reform Member: You haven’t walked off tour farm. Mr Harris: No, and I’m not going to do it, but T know the feeling which exists among the farming community.