PUBLIC ACCOUNTS

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 4 June 1928, Page 9

PUBLIC ACCOUNTS

THE YEAR’S OPERATIONS.

SURPLUS OF £179,077. THE PRINCIPAL ITEMS. [by telegraph—press association.] WELLINGTON, June 2. Public accounts for the year ended March 31, 1928, appear in a special Gazette this week. The Minister of Finance issued the following summary of the transactions. In the ordinary revenue account the receipt's were £25,123,950, and the expenditure £24,944,903, leaving a surplus of £179,077. Comparisons with the previous year are as under: —Revenue: The total revenue received for the year amounted to £25,123,950, as -compared with £24,943,107 for the previous year, an increase of £180,873. The principal increases are: Motor vehicle duties, licenses, etc., £369.115, consequent on the passing of the Motor Spirits Taxation Act, 1927, and section 24 of the Finance Act, 1927 (No. 2), whereby receipts from the Customs -duties -on .tyres, licenses, fees and fines -under the -Motor Vehicles Act, 1924, and the recently instituted tax on motor spirits are shown as receipts under the -ordinary revenue account. This increase is offset by increases in expenditure under the special Acts where the agreements of most of these amounts, principally to the Main Highways account, are shown in stamp and death duties £125,351, Post and Telegraph £96,702, interest on public moneys £96,837, interest on public debt redemption fund £14,466, interest on railways capital liability £87,434. The principal decreases are: Customs £309,986, land tax £74,588, income tax £148,487, recoveries on account of expenditure on previous years £39,160. The expenditure for the year was: Permanent appropriations £14,879,377, annual appropriations £10,065,526, total £24,944,903, as compared with permanent appropriations £14,264,945, annual appropriations £10,091,020, total £24,355,965 during 1926-27, an increase of £588,938. This was made up as follows: Permanent appropriations. £614-, 432 (increase), annual appropriations £25,494 (decrease), a total of £588,938. The expenditure under permanent appropriations shows an increase of £614,432, the principal increases being redemption of funded debt £17,607, Repayment of Public Debt Act, 1925, £52,235, under special Acts £603,528. Under this last heading the principal items of increase are: Contributions to Singapore base £125,000, Family Allowances Act, 1926, £37,500, subsidy to working railways account in respect of losses on branch lines and isolated sections £55,600, subsidies to hospitals and charitable aid institutions £64,400, old age and war 'pensions £51,500, allocation of petrol tax, tyre tax, fees and fines £357,000. The following items show decreases: Fruit export guarantee £83,600, transfer to advances to other Government accounts £30,000. The expenditure on interest shows a decrease of £53,720, due principally to increased recoveries of interest paid on behalf of discharged soldiers’ settlement account and hind for settlement account.

The expenditure under the annual appropriations shows a decrease of £25,494, the increases being shown as under: Department of Agriculture £43,540, Department of Education £20,018, Department of Scientific and Industrial Research £41,776, while there are decreases as follows: P. and T. working expenses £46,380, public buildings £28,534, Department of Internal Affairs £53,147, naval defence £40,193.