TIMELY RELIEF GIVEN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21225, 4 July 1932, Page 9

TIMELY RELIEF GIVEN.

REDUCING TAXATION LOAD.

MORE MONEY FOR INDUSTRY.

SAVING IN DEBT INTEREST.

3y Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright. British Wireless. RUGBY, July 1. In a broadcast- speech on the conversion scheme, the aciing-Prime Minister, Mr. Stanley Baldwin, said if ho might jud|je by what he Eaw in the House of Commons and in the papers to-day and bv what be heard said everywhere, there was not a shadow of dcubt that the public would see this thing through. '• We have gonis a fong way since the dark davs of last autumn, but much remains to be done, he said. " One of the obstacles is the burden of taxation. It is; the duty of the Government to seize every chance of reducing expenditure and thus reducing the amount to be taken from people in taxation. " It is providential that just when our burden most needs reducing, there comes this chance of making a very large savins in debt interest while scrupulously observing every obligation to which the faith of the country has been pledged. " The greatest pre-war scheme for ihe conversion of debts in this country was tha"- effected by Viscount Goschen in 13313. The immediate saving then effected was £1.400,000, bi>t the yearly immediate saving aimed at in the present scheme is about 16 times; as great. 1,1 Lord Goschen was dealing with practica'lv the whole of the National Debt on that occasion, but our scheme relates only to the" War Loan, which is less: than one-third of the present National Deiiit. " A scheme of equal importance to industry is that the great mass of the £2.000,000,C00 stock, bearing 5 per cent, interest, has been dead-weight on the capital market for many years. Neither the State, local authorities nor British industries could obtain capital on such cheap terms as -our restored national credit really justified. " This scheme, when it is through, will enable industry to get the money it needs more cheaply, and will do more than any othi»r new thing the Government or the country can do at tne present moment to set the wheels of industry going again." Mr. Baldwin read a letter from the Prime Minister, Mir. P.amsay Mac Donald, to ithe Chancellor oi the Exchequer, Mr. Neiille Chamberlain, in which the former said: " Holdeats oi the loan, whether large or small, will, I am confident, respond to the Government's appeal with tha same goodwill and patriotism which the British peopls: has always shewn whin a great national effort is required. Ii itvery holder oi: War Loan stock will play his pari; by responding quickly, another great stop forward will have beeia iaken toward the restoration of naiiicnal prosperity."