THE FINANCIAL POSITION OF NEW ZEALAND.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XV, Issue 222, 18 September 1880, Page 4

THE FINANCIAL POSITION OF NEW ZEA LAND.

It is well that we should know the view taken in England of the financial position of the oolony, and this has never been more plainly exD^sßfid than in* a recent article in the. Pall Mall Gazette The dark side of 1 th 6' picture is evidently the one looked at, tut we cannot deny the fact that there is over much of truth contained in the following statement :— The total debt of New Zealand now amounts to 28 milliooß, imposing an annual charge of £1,400,000 for interest, and £116000 for sinking fund — together, £1,516,000, or £3 8a per head per annum on the small population of 450 000 persons. The railways built by the State may be worth 12 millions, but they are worked at a considerable loss. About twenty-five new lines of railway are in course cf construction ; but the time of opening ond the financial results when open are both uncertain ; and in the meantime, and until the earnings of the unopened lines fully cover the working expenses and the interest and sinking fund on the money borrowed to build them, the deficit must be supplied by heavier nnd heavier taxep. The taxes in New Zsaland are already much heavier than in the neighboring coloniep, to the manifest discouragement of the influx into it of capital and labor. The land sales have fallen off rapidly, and the last Budget disclosed a deficit of not less than one million. To meet this in some degree tb.9 ad valorum duties on imported goods were raieed 5 per cenf, or to 15 par cant, and several specific duties were advanced, The severe measure in a new colouy of a property tax of one penny in the pound on the value of " all property " w&s also adopted, the (ax to be assessed in localities by three "reviewers." The mania, for buying and speculating in land came to a sudden stoppage on the failure of the City of Grlaßgow Baok in tb© autumn of 1878. The banks had as usual made considerable advances to borrowers supposed to be solvent, and taken as security a Hen on the lands purchased. These advances are now being rapidly recoiled; and there ia good reason to believe that the recent activity in the formation in and out of (he colony of mortgage and investment companies is closely connected with the desire of the books to get back their advances on one side, and the desire of the borrowers to pay back the banks j with the money of the proposed and projected companies. When the loan of five million was floated a few months ago with great success, by virtue of the novel agency of the Bank of England — for we are not aware that, the Bank of England had previously appeared in the same capacity-ran undertaking was given that New Zealand would not appear again as a borrower for at least three years. It ia certain beyond all cavil that during these three years the colony must encounter great financial difficulties. Fortunate seasons may possibly carry it through the peril, but candor compels the admission that, accoidiog to present facts and appearances, collapse is quite as probable as success. At all events it is high time that there should be a cessation of the voluminous, persistent, and barefaced puffing of the "Britain of the Antipodes," not only here in London but up and down the whole country, not omitting the remotest corners of it. The Government and people of New i Zealand have bad far more of English

money than is good for them or for us, and they must dow prove by actual remittances that they can pay the interest and sinking fund on the o'd loans by ! oiber means than contracting new ones.