DOMINION FINANCE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21362, 16 June 1931, Page 11

DOMINION FINANCE

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —In a footnote to my letter published on Saturday you state that the deficiency was only £1,639,111, yet in your editorial of February 21 you stated that the Government, in the first nine months of the financial year, had borrowed over £11,700,000 internally. Out of this sum they had only repaid a little over £1,600,000 of old debt, which meant a total fresh indebtedness of over £10,000,000. Thus, to your figures of £1,639,111 must be added the sum of over £10,000,000, plus any fresh borrowings during the last three montha of the financial year. This then shows our financial position to be even worse than that of Australia. I must also state that I quite realise that many salaried and business men have suffered more than a 10 per cent, cut, but my effusion was not directed at their remuneration, but at loan interest, mortgage interest, etc. If all other sections of the community have to be content with smaller returns, why should not such things be cut too? — I am, etc., SCOTTY. June 15. [Our correspondent confuses the Consolidated Fund with the loan accounts. The deficit on last year’s revenue account was £1,639,111. It will doubtless surprise “ Scotty ” to be told that, despite this deficit, the Consolidated Fund showed a surplus at March 31 of £278,601. The deficit, therefore, did not involve any fresh indebtedness— Ed., O.D.T.]