CURRENT TOPICS.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1108, 26 May 1893, Page 21

CURRENT TOPICS.

A MAGNIFICENT SURPLUS. + Tjie main feature of the year's accounts, which we publish in another column, is the magnificent gross surplus which they record on the year's operations. The Treasurer estimated that his surplus, including L 165,000 brought forward from the previous year, would be L 330,000. Since then the Supplementary Estimates were added to the expenditure side of the "account. Nevertheless the surplus of the year has reached the handsome sum of L 511,288. That beats the colonial record. The estimate of revenue was bettered by no less a sum than L 173.735. Writing in January last on the receipts for the first three quarters of the year we pointed out that they had bettered .the receipts of the corresponding period of the previous yeareliminating the direct taxation which was not sufficiently in evidence to enable the two periods to be compared—by L 82,000. We added that in view of the elasticity displayed the fourth quarter's receipts could safely be regarded as likely to add their proportion of betterment, bringing up the betterment of the year 1892 93 over the actual, receipts of the previous year to LIIO.OOO. We concluded that as the estimate for 1892-93 was less than the actual revenue of 1891-92 by L 26.000 (exclusive of the proceeds of direct taxation), the revenue for 1892-93 would probably exceed the estimate by L 136,000. That conclusion was laughed to scorn by some of our critics. Now the revenue, as the figures show, has bettered the estimate along the whole line by L 173.735. The figures areProperty Tax £17,126 Excess of actual over estimated Land and Income Tax... 15.000 Excess of other revenue ... 141,609 £173,735 Our calculation, it will be seen, of ,the excess of receipts, exclusive of direct taxation, was not only not wildly too large, but actually L 5609 under the n.ark. Had the lonic and Ruahine not been delayed on the voyage out their cargoes would have considerably increased the amount. The event has", we claim, very fairly sustained our calculations. The excess of L 173,735 over estimate, on the whole line, is a striking proof of the elasticity of the public resources. Every head of revenue but one has contributed. The territorial revenue has decreased by LSOOO. The increases are (roughly stated)—Customs, L 67.000; stamps, L 36,000; railways, L 34,000; land and income tax, L 15,000; registration, L 3000; miscellaneous, L 4700 ; beer duty, LI3OO. The most gratifying of these highly satisfactory items is the excess of land and income tax. That L 15,000 is a striking answer to the prognostications that the new taxation might not give the Treasurer the money he required. The actual receipts were L 15,000 over the estimate, and L9OOO above the amount (L 356,000) of the property tax, which the new taxation replaced. The Colony has safely crossed the stream : the incidence of taxation has been amended and' all goes well, the revenue of the year having bettered the receipts of its predecessor by L 138,750. The gross surplus of L 011,288 will make a sensation when it is announced in London and the neighbouring colonies. The Treasury has paid the promised L 200,000 to the public works fund ; it has made good the deficiency in the year's land fund account, which was reduced below expectation by the swelling of the land fund receipts : and there is the handsome sum in cash of L 282,000 for Parliament to deal with. And there is not a murmur throughout the country at the weight of the taxation. Thus closes the best find most progressive year in our annals. The policy of prudent self-reliance ia justifying itself magnificently.