METHODIST MISSIONS

Manawatu Standard, Volume LXV, Issue 227, 24 August 1945, Page 7

METHODIST MISSIONS

HELP FOR SOLOMONS. Cabinet has decided to make to the Alethodist Foreign Mission Society of Now Zealand a special grant ol £12,450 as a rebate of succession duty paid on the legacy bequeathed by the late Samuel Gorman and also to compensate the society in part lor tiie mission property that was destroyed in the Solomon Islands during the war against Japan. This special grant will prove ol material help to the society, whose property losses in the Solomons as a result of the war aggregate £IOO,IIOO. The decision of the Government to make this special grant arose from representations made relating to the legacy left to the society by. the late Samuel Gorman and the amount ol succession duty paid. The original estate was just over £90,000 and alter some small specific gifts had been provided lor under the will the .whole was left to the Alethodist Church, two-thirds to the Foreign Alission Society, and one-third to the Home and Maori Alission. The total duties payable amounted to about £49,000, of which the bequest to the Home and Alaori Alission carried approximately £13,000 and the gi ft of nearly £60,000 to the Overseas Alission carried about £36,000, leaving rather less than £24,000 to the Foreign Alission. The gift to tho Foreign Mission Society

carried succession duty because it was a charitable gift for an object outside of New Zealand. The Alethodist Alission Board, at tho instance of Air C. E. Taylor, of Feilding, set up a committee to go fully into the position of the gift and the succession duty and subsequently arranged for a deputation to wait on the Alinister of Finance (Air Nash). The case placed before the Alinister was that, having regard to tho complete destruction of the whole of tho buildings and improvements in tho Solomon Islands Alission field, the Government might see fit to make a special grant by way ol remission of some of the succession duty paid. The whole of the facts were set out before the Alinister, who accorded the speakers (who included Air Taylor, of l Feilding) a sympathetic hearing. It was pointed out that the whole of a large hospital and many buildings connected with the hospital had been completely wiped out at Vella Lavella and the "Alission Society was faced with a large expenditure to replace the structure and other buildings connected with the very successful missionary enterprise founded some 43 years ago. Tho result of the _ representations made to the Alinister is that the Alission Society out of the gift of approximately £OO.OOO will benefit to tho extent of £36 000 net instead of approximately £24.000. The gift to the Home and Alaori Alission is not affected under this special grant, because that gift did not carry succession duty.