CORRESPONDENCE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9021, 6 April 1888, Page 3

CORRESPONDENCE.

THE PROPERTY TAX. TO THE EDITOR.

Sir,— Now that we are privileged to have in our city three Ministers of the Crown— viz., the Hon. Sir F. Whitaker, AttorneyGeneral, the Hon. George Fisher, Minister of Education, and the Hon. E. Mitchelson, Minister of Public Worke and Native Affaire, the time is opportune for a few more words on that American abomination —the Property Tax. I sincerely hope that a deputation consisting of our local members of both Houses of Parliament, and some leading members of the Chamber of Commerce, will wait upon those gentlemen to protest against this tax; and that the Cabinet Ministers may be induced to address the citizens of Auckland in public meeting. Wβ do not object to taxation, but we must rise to a man and object to this form of taxation, or we shall be ruined, and our wives and little ones made wanderers on the face of the earth. When a ship at sea springs a leak, it is essential that the leakage be stopped, or drowning becomes only a question of time ; and when population and capital are flowing out of a country her ruin is inevitable, unless the outflow be stopped. At present capital is being driven out of New Zealand, and fresh capital kept from entering, whilst the bone and sinew of the population are flocking away from our shores. But that is not all. Many mon are leaving their families behind; if they can, they will send for them, and then hundreds more houses will be empty, and tradesmen will have a emaller turn-over ; but if they cannot send, those of us who are left must keep the poor and needy. Hence the coming winter may be a black one, and cast its shadow over the hitherto well-to-do. They are not prepared for too great a strain. To keep things straight many have borrowed up to the Lilt; hence private mortgagee, which stood at £27,735,370 in March, 1886, reached £29,816,405 in March, 1887. Now that the borrowing limit is reached in most cases, we may drift into a critical position unless a master hand grips the wheel. Of course we are all to blame for this state of things. We have been so taken up with pleasure-seeking or money-making that we have allowed any carpet-bagger or political gambler to get into Parliament. Many men of sense and position, who could have legislated wisely, allowed politics to drift, while they vainly tried to hatch big schemes, which were addled in the process; and now the last state of all concerned is worse than the first. It is lamentable that our pluckiest and best colonists who have founded this young nation are now harassed in their declining years through bad legislation. Of all our bad laws the property tax law is about the worst. It scareu people and saps their vital resisting power ; it cuts at the root of a nation's life and progress by checking improvements ; it deters capitalists from employing labour, and thus it cripples the working man; it keeps capital away even now when people might be expected to sell out in Melbourne and buy in New Zealand, because property is high there and low here; it robs the merchant of all profit on his goods which have proved unsaleable year after year; it has induced a state cf things fatal to safe investment; it is driving away the men we need to develop the country, and who would help us to pay nearly £9000 a-day interest. It takes the heart out of those whose energy is essential to a nation's well-being; and in some cases ite oppressiveness ie more worthy of an Asiatic despotism than a British colony. I hope, therefore, that the people will arise to a man, and say to their rulers: "Gentlemen,—We are willing to pay you whatever just and necessary taxes you re- 1 quire for good government, if you will dispense with this tax, which is smiting us with the blight and mildew of decay ; but if you will not do so, we shall show that we have got a kick left in us before more parliamentary bungling necessitates the ad-

vent of a bum-bailiff, alias a Crown admin* iatrator, sent to wring from us John Bull's interest."— am, etc., " ':', F. G. , Ewmoxoir*