Manawatu Evening Standard. THURSDAY, JULY 17, 1941. AN ELECTION BUDGET.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXI, Issue 193, 17 July 1941, Page 6

Manawatu Evening Standard. THURSDAY, JULY 17, 1941. AN ELECTION BUDGET.

Any doubts •whether there will be an election this year must have been settled with the presentation of the Financial Statement last evening-. The Minister for Finance appears to have been intent on avoiding anything’ which might prove damaging to the Government when it takes to the lilistings. The taxpayer will be agreeably surprised to find that there is to be no increase in the burden. placed upon him, yet without doubt he was fully prepared to meet further demands for the prosecution of the war. For this he will be thankful. Soldiers’ wives with one or more dependent children will receive a domestic allowance of a shilling a day, and provision has been made to extend the social security benefits in a helpful direction without appurentlv adding much to the cost of the scheme. Such are the benefits in this year’s Budget, and the Minister no doubt will receive his meed of praise for what he has done. It is in the direction of civil expenditure that the Budget falls short of national aspirations, for the Government has turned a deaf ear to all pleas to economise, and for this country, its figures arc really astronomical. The past financial year was a good one, realising a surplus in the Consolidated Fund of £1,720,000, but it may be pointed out that £1,700,000 was transferred to the Social Security Fund and not.being fequircd has lieen invested for future use, and £1,093,000 was paid to the Public Works General Purpose?/ Fund and used ultimately under the Loans Redemption Account to redeem Treasury bills. The true’ surplus was therefore very much higher. Since it has taken office the Government has nro\ed itself the greatest spending and taxing force the country has known. In 1935-30 permanent and annual appropriations totalled £25,890,56i. against £38,711,502 in 1940-41, and an estimate of £38,812,000 in the current period but which, with the addition of supplementary estimates, etc., is raised to £39,212,000. Against this huge sum —and it does not take stock of the war expenditure—is revenue estimated at £39,290,000, a reduction of £1,142,000 compared with the past financial year. It is quite obvious that no effort has been made at all to adjust the country’s civil expenditure to the times, "when the war effort calls for strict economy and the harnessing of the nation to its successful prosecution. The War Expenses Account did not give much information relative to the past year. In the current period expenditure is estimated at £69,700,000, nearly double last year’s - . It will be financed by a loan from Britain of £31,000,000 and by borrowing £13,000,000 within the Dominion, the remainder coming from taxation (the national security tax alone providing £10,000,000) and transfers from the Consolidated Fund. The war must be financed, but the Government which at first made much of its “pay as you go ’ policy has now resolved upon a way to help it in its electioneering.

It has refused to boldly face its problems—the major one of economising in civil expenditure to aid the war effort and cushion the strain upon the country generally by its tremendous cost. The Budget condemns the Government for this and the public will do so too.