The Northern Advocate Daily “NORTHLAND FIRST” Registered for transmission through the post as a Newspaper TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1941. Britain's War Expenditure

Northern Advocate, 16 September 1941, Page 4

The Northern Advocate Daily “NORTHLAND FIRST” Registered for transmission through the post as a Newspaper TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1941. Britain's War Expenditure

BRITAIN’S financial contribution to the cause of world liberation from the tyranny which Nazi rule would constitute was revealed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir Kingsley Wood, in a recent speech. He said: “We have willingly imposed on ourselves the heaviest financial burden, not for our own account, but for the common cause of freedom and justice.” In these words he set out the attitude of the British people towards the war, emphasising that everything had been subordinated to the winning of the struggle. This may be realised when it is reflected that the British Government has recently been spending at the rate of £12,500,000 a day, and that of this enormous sum no less than £10,500,000 has been devoted to war purposes. Tremendous as these figures are, they do not greatly exceed the rate forecasted in the Chancellor’s Budget speech in March last. The actual expenditure last year was £3,884,000,000, which was declared to be insufficient in view of the urgent needs of the country. The increase which has taken place in the subsequent rate of expenditure will therefore not be a subject of criticism, but it is nevertheless remarkable that the nation is able to meet the demands made upon it. What the burden of war really is may be realised from the fact that in the year before the war the total State expenditure was less than £950,000,000, or about £2,600,000 a day, which is little more than one-fifth of what is being spent today. This indicates the price the people of Britain are paying to secure the safety not of themselves alone but of the Empire and the freedom-loving peoples of the world.