HOSPITAL BOARD

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21506, 1 June 1933, Page 12

HOSPITAL BOARD

FINANCE AND THE LEVY NORTH SHORE INTERESTS Several aspects of hospital administration were discussed by Mr. W. K. Howitt, the North Shore member of the Auckland Hospital Board, at a meeting of the Birkenhead Borough Council last evening.

There was no prospect of the establishment of a hospital on the North Shore while the depression continued, said atr. Howitt. The idea of the Health Department was to centralise, in order to provide the most modern service. The Hospital Board was losing on the Warkworth Hospital and was willing to pay a subsidy to a nurse to take control of it. Mr. Howitt said Birkenhead was-the only borough on the North Shore in which the capital value had shown an increase recently. The capital value was £912,14;}, an increase of £10.165, and the hospital rate of ,26d would involve £ll "more than last year, or £9BB. The levy would have been reduced if the Government had not charged the board with £.'52,000 advanced for relief arising from unemployment. Mr. Howitt forecast lower levies in the near future, as next vear a loan of £25,000 matured and the sum necessary for interest and sinking fund charges would not have to be collected. In a few years loans totalling £2OO 000 would fall due and tiib .sinking funds would be ample for io; ayr.ieut. There would then be a loan indebtedness of only £85,000 and the board would be in a good nnanioal position.

Mr. Howitt was accorded a vote of appreciation of his> work on the board.