PUBLIC BODY TRADING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20947, 10 August 1931, Page 11

PUBLIC BODY TRADING.

QUESTION OF TAXATION.

UNTAPPED SOURCE OF REVENUE

BURDEN OF PRIVATE ENTERPRISE

Tlie (axes that are to be levied on the community under the Budget proposals could have been reduced by many thousands of pounds—collectable annually —had the Government availed itself of the untapped source of revenue that is provided by the levying of taxation on power boards and 011 municipal gas and electric light undertakings operating in competition with private enterprise, says a statement issued by the Associated Chambers of Commerce of New Zealand. For the second time in his Budget the Prime Minister has thrown away a means of considerable revenue, the use of which would have served the two-fold purpose of swelling the national exchequer and putting to rights a long-standing injustice that calls for rectification. However, not only has this means of revenue been ignored in face of strong representations, but additional taxation is actually levied in the Budget on these private trading concerns, adding still further to the burden they have to bear, while their competitors go free. The position is that the city councils and gas companies of Wellington, Auckland, Christchurch, Napier and other places ar.e in competition in tho supply of lighting, power and heat. In Christchurch the municipal electrical department competes with private traders by selling electrical appliances to the public and even has sole agencies for goods of this class, besides which it carries out wiring Contracts. This competition has been so serious that it has had the effect of crushing private traders of long standing. This is simply because the private traders have to pay to the State heavy exactions, from which 'municipal concerns, in common with power boards, are blissfully immune by the favour of a benevolent Government. For 1930 the gas companies in the three cities named paid in land, income and debenture taxes the sum of £53,579. The electrical departments in competition with them paid nothing. Owing to the increase of 20 per cent, in the surtax provided by tho 1931 Budget, tho three gas companies will now have to pay an additional £8458 per annum (Wellington, £2311; Auckland, £4079; Christchurch, £2068). Power boards and municipal electrical departments again pay nothing. Thus are the latter concerns better equipped than ever to wage war against private enterprise, which is further weakened by this attack of the Government on its flank.