LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 17103, 7 September 1917, Page 5

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.

THE INCOME TAX.

Sib, —I have to thank you for inserting in your issue of sth inst. my letter pointing out the anomalous position arising from tho proposed refund to shareholders (enjoying not more than a total income of £300) of income tax paid by a company on such shareholders' behalf in respect of dividends paid to them. The anomalv has to some extent been remedied by the amendment made by Governor's Message, and quoted in your issue of this morning. A refund is now to be made to shareholders enjoying a total income of less than £400, and the total income, plus the refund, must not now exceed 6 per cent, on the total amount paid up by the shareholders in the company. In arriving at the refund a deduction is made by the commissioner of the tax that would have been payable if the whole income were' taxable —which is fair, seeing that a refund of tax is to be allowed, but such refund is comparatively small. Whilst'the anomaly is to a great extent removed, it may still exist, as anomalies will always exist when a clear-cut line is drawn that imposes oh the man on one side of a fence penalties which the man ■on the other' side escapes, and it is more so when it is proposed to make a refund that is not based on a graduated scale. For the benefit of such of your readers as are interested, I giyc the following example:—

A company has capital of £150,000, and makes a gross profit of ... £15,000 It pays tax, 7s 6d in the £1, on £15,000 ... 5,625 It pays 4- per cent, dividend 6,000 Adds to reserve or provides for con-. tingencies ... 2,000 And carries forward '. 1,375 £15,000 A, the largest shareholder, has £11,000 invested, and his dividend, at 4 per cent., is £440. ' B has £9500 invested, and his dividend, at 4 per cent., is £330, which is his only income. He obtains a refund from the commissioner of 7s od in the £1 on £3EO ... £142 10 0 Less amount that he would be taxed on an income of £522 10s, which works out at Is 3d on £222 10s, after deducting £300 exemption 13 18 0

B would thereforo enjoy, including refund, a net income of £508 12s —as a return on his capital, £9500, —whoreaa A, his co-shareholder, with £11,000 capital, would receive only £440. Other shareholders with the same interest as B would, of course, receive like results, provided that thev fulfilled the same qualification of receiving a total income of less than £400. and the State would lose a fair amount of the uik that it received from the company. If, instead of a company, the shareholders were partners, they would be assessed, separately on their individual shares of the- gross profits at the rate applicable to their particular share, and thoso whiftso total income was under "£3©o would havo no tax to pay, and those whose income was under £400 would receive no refund, and no such anomaly would exist-.

I am aware that I have drawn a somewhat hypothetical case to bring out the anomaly, but it will also exist if a shareholder holds shares in several companies paying only 4 per cent., or oven 5 per cent. The shareholder who receives just under £400 as bis only income has an advantage over shai-e----holders with incomes £400—very much greater than tho relative position warrants. There is the danger, too, 'if "dummying" the shares to bring about the desired result.

Whilst on tho subject of, income tax, T may remark that companies with, say, £100,000 capital, and earning only 5 per cent, or 6 per oont., are "hit" by the taxationproposals very much more _ severely than companies with smaller capital, earning a high rate. Provision should be made, or should have been made, in tho Finance Bill to meet eas3s such as this. —I am, etc., Aegos. September 6. INDECENT ASSAULTS ON CHILDREN Sie,— yWr report to-day of the ordinary meeting oi our City Council contains an itam which is of the gravest importance to our community and" I feel compelled, althougn reluctantly, to call public attention to it. A letter was rea-d from the town clerk of Riccarton asking the City Council to ondorso the following resolution: "That this council respectively urges the Minister of Justice at once to amend the law so as to make flogging part oi tho punishment in all cases whero men arc convicted of indecent assaults upon children." I feel that all honour is due to the Kiecarton Council for taking up the cause of children who cannot themselves plead for any redress for tho wrongs inflicted upon them by base men. Ono might fairly have expected that such a proposal would have been readily and heartily endorsed by the members of our City Council, but such was not the case. Fourteen councillors were present, but not one of them raased a voice of protest against an iniquity which is one of the crying wrongs of the dominion or expressed any endorsement of the proposal of the Riccarton Council. Or Scott; moved that the letter be received, and said that to inflict another brutaJiry for a brutal crime did not co/idone it. Sir, is it an a«t of brutality to flog a man who maims and injures for life a little helpless girl? Justice, with a thousand voices cries, No! It is the only form of penalty which would influence men who are so utterly lost to morality aJid humanity. Cr Gilkison, in seconding tho motion, argued that theao men are almost always men of weak intellect and therefore ought not to b» auhiaci to flossaaat. This ifl ill

the more surprising because of the position which Cr Gflkison holds as a member of the Society for the Protection of Women and Children, It seems to me that his argument is exceedingly weak. The intellects of these offenders are not so weak but that they can devise cunning ' arguments to tempt and deceive innocent children, and it has been found by experience that flogging does act as a deterrent with both those whose intellects are weak and those whoso intellects are clear. The motion by Cr Scott was, we are told, carried on the voices. I venture to Bay there is not a woman in tins city who, on reading the report, does not burn with indignation that not one of our councillors ventured to support the resolution of tho Eicoarton Borough. Not one of them had any alternative, proposal to make, nor did they make any reference to the terrible menace to oar children. The Riecarton Council may not be aware that there is a law on our Statute Book which provides that men who are guilty of assault upon children shall be liable to imprisonment with hard labour for seven years and upwards with floggings, but it is left to the option of the judge to inflict floggings, and this rule of the law is very seldom enforced. At the' Supreme Court in Christchuroh, on August 6 last, tho grand jury, in vie' - of the alarming increase of ttieso crimes, brought in a strong recommendation that the punishment oi severe flogging should be resorted to* If our City Councillors will not support a proposal which would without doubt act as a deterrent, then it is time that women appealed for legislation which would empower them to eit on juries and on city councils for tho defence of innocent and suffering children who cry to us for redress for the wrongs inflicted upon them.—• On behalf of the children, I am, etc., A. T. P. Dbiveb. [Women may at tho present tune be. • elected to tho City Council—Ed. CLD.TJ

"THE ENEMY OF MANKIND." Sm,—ln your leading article, under toe above heading, you quote largely and with approval from an article written by Lord Jtsryce, which undoubtedly summarises very clearly the reasons why practically the whole oivjliscd world has risen in arms to oppose Germany in the present world conflict. I think, however, that there is one part of Lord Bryce's article that will not meet with universal acceptance by your readers— that part, namely, in which he attempts to draw a distinction between the "tyrannical Government" of Germany and the German people themselves. This opens & very big question and one by no means easy to answer. How far are the German people -themselves answerable for tho crimes of which their Government has been guilty? That the German people are guiltless in this matter, and that they have been drawn unwittingly and unwillingly into the present war and into the oommittal iof these outrages that have appalled the world is hard to believe. It must be allowed that' the form of Government in Germany has lent itself readily to the inculoation,ol the Prussian military idea in the minds of the German people, and that the powers that be in Germany have missed no opportunity over since the Franco-Prussian war of furthering these autocratic military ' ideas preparatory to making their great bid for what they styled " Welt-Gernacht" A free democratic form of government such as our own would certainly have prevented the rapid spread of the ideas winch Prussian militarists so diligently encouraged hi the schools, churches and universities of Germany. Political liberty has not existed - in Germany. All expression of opinion hostile to Prussian militarism, and to the building of a huge army and navy has been easily crushed out The appointments to schools, churches, and universities were made by the State and were filled by men; like Treitschke, the famous German historian, and others, who were -quite willing to spread . the Prussian propaganda. Had they op- 1 posed these ideas they would' have beea x summarily dismissed. Those who have read Professor Bang's "Hurrah and Hallelujah" will know how the Church in Germany, instead of opposing _ doctrines that were immoral and Anti-Christian, actually furthered them, I can think of no explanation of this phenomenon except that " whom the gods destroy they first _ mako mad." That there was a.steady, if not rapid, deterioration in tho German national character from the time of the Franco-Prus-sian war is shown by careful observers, and ■is fully treated of in such books as the Erlangen Professor Smith's "Soul of Germany," and De Halsalle's " inany." Long before the outbreak of this war, tho national ideals were being forged, , the German Church had apostatised very largely from the Christian ideals, and crimes especially those of a brutal nature, were rampant in "Germany. This war has revealed the soul of Germany in its nakedness, and the committal of crime on her part no longer evokes surprise. For these crimes the German nation and the individual German are answerable. I believe that the Germans themselves largely scout the idea t that they and their Government are two distinct things, and it has been hard for them to understand the pronouncements of British publicists, iike Lord Bryce, when they state that the object of the Allies is not to crush the German people but to free the German State from the yoke ot Prussian militarism. As Mr Lloyd George has said, " Germany is no longer a State; it is an army." The German army or State must be effectually beaten to her knees before any good of a permanent nature can come to the world, and if the German citizen' has l been responsible as well as his Government for the causes that'led up to this war—and I contend he has—then it is only right that ho • should share some of the punishment that ■ must be meted out to those in authority over him. —I am, eto., Heriot. Patos - Dtotwp. As illustrative of the point which he makes, our correspondent directs our attention to a letter, published in the Spectator, written by a British soldier from his gun pit on the western front The soldier writes: "It seams, then,, that we're to chuck ■ it as soon as the Germans chuck the' Kaiser.

I don't agree that he people don't share his guilt. H English officers ordered our fellows to do what the Bosche does, they'd not onlv bo cashiered, but their men would flatfy and absolutely refuse. Why? Because we've got a standard that ©very. Tommy understands. It is often, perhaps, chivalry that prevents'him from damaging women who don't freely offer themselves for damage. But. besides this, he knows that it is not the thing, that ©very one would at on him for it, and so he knows it is wrong to outrage the defenceless—and ho never does it. This is worth mentioning . in view ■of what one reads in the newspapers about the Bosche infamy being 'tuenecessary evil of war.' It seems necessary only to Germans, and no one has a right to condemn war and soldiering on such grounds. But with the Germans, .whatever tho people themselves may have been, tho thing has been not only, tolerated but encouraged. Do you suppose that the average German private (bred, mind you, in a German -* school atmosphere, Government- . shadowed all along) can find it easy in hia - conscience to condemn what has been upheld by his superiors for thtse three years, and oven before? .The fact of the wrong standard above means, I feel pretty aure, an ultimate wrong standard all through, just as a right standard above conduces to morality wherever discipline teaches men to look up for an example. Tommy know* that his officers, however impure they may be, are abovo certain crimes, and regard them as crimes, so, of course, he too regards them as crimes., But the Bosche, I don t suppose he does. I mention ■. this because I hold our quarrel will not be ended with the abdication or dethronement of either the Kaiser,or the much-mouthed ' militarism.' It is a quarrel now with the ideals and manners and habits of, the whole German people, and the few innocent must suffer with- the huge guilty acquiescent majoritv. You won't change the people by removing the Kaiser. I'm all for removing tho people themselves to such an extent that the ideals of tho remnant won't count any more in matters of moment. If only the officers were the brutes arid thoir soldiers moral paragons, the officers would have been deposed long ago." In a later letter the soldier writes:— ' Farther confirmation of my views is in the report of the wav German nurses treated our. wounded". If tho women arc like that. I seo no grounds for supposing the iren to bo any better, and that is why I indict the whole" people."—Ed. O.D.T-1