STATE FINANCES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27386, 11 May 1950, Page 8

STATE FINANCES

Demand For Expenditure MR HOLLAND’S WARNING PA WELLINGTON, May 10. There were departments of State requisitioning for expenditure far and away above the resources of the country, said the Prime Minister, Mr Holland, opening the convention of the New t Zealand Institute of Public Administration tonight. Mr Holland recommended that the institute should give very close study to the principles of administration of .State finances. One thing standing out above all others, he said, was the very substantial disregard there had been in New Zealand for the place where the money came from. There were about 50 departments of State engaged in spending money and one department saying whether the money was available—so departments were declaring and requisitioning what they required and one saying whether the expenditure was possible. Mr Holland quoted figures already published to illustrate the financial problems confronting the Government. “ Our greatest difficulty,” he said, “ is that there is such an easy way out—the way of inflation which is so easy but so disastrous.”