N.Z. WAR EXPENDITURE

Greymouth Evening Star, 21 September 1940, Page 2

N.Z. WAR EXPENDITURE

MORE THAN £lOO,OOO DAILY. [per press association.] INVERCARGILL, September 20. “We are spending three-quarters of a million every week, or more than £ 100,000 a day, on war work today. The War Cabinet is a team of five men, contracting for, and directing, expenditure on a scale that was not exceeded by the entire Budget of the Dominion only a few years ago. That was the comment of Mr. Hamilson, Leader of the Opposition, when he was interviewed in Invercargill tonight about the work of the War Cab- , x, . , “We have settled down to trie 30b, after the initial stage. It is now soijie two months since the War Cabinet was formed,” Mr. Hamilton continued. “People often ask what we are doing, and how we are getting on. I am afraid that it is not the softt of business that is accompanied with full page advertisements, but I can assure everyone that we are very much on the job. I would say that those who stop to think tor an instant must realise the magnitude of the task. - The War Cabinet directs and controls our entire war effort, and the emergency regulations connected with that effort. The work of the War Cabinet, in the main, is secret, and the subjects and information discussed must be retained in the fewest possible hands, whether it is supplies, ships, equipment, troop movements, munitions, general organisation, oi information from various parts of the world. The reason for this is clear. That is why it is not publicised in the normal manner.”