WAR EXPENDITURE

Otago Witness, Issue 3413, 13 August 1919, Page 23

WAR EXPENDITURE

SIR JOSEPH WARD'S VIEWS. AUCKLAND, August 5. When asked whether he expected • that tinder Jhe indemnity and reparation proposals in the peace terms New Zealand would receive any repayment for the expenditure incurred in connection with the part she took in. the war, Sir Joseph Ward said it was exceedingly difficult to forecast the outcome in this respect. Ho was quite firm in his view that the enemy should pay the whole cost of the war and also bear the burden of restoration of tb» ruined cities, towns, and villages in Belgium and France, where much of the destruction had been wilfully carried out by enemy forces, but no definite estimate of the result of the financial _ proposals of the treaty could, -. in his opinion, be made at present. It was necessary to wait and gee. In the meantime the only safe course for New Zealand to pursue from a financial standpoint was not to count upon anything coming to her, at all events at present under this heading. Indeed, he thought that all the other parts of the British Empire, as well as our Allies, except in the case of restoration work in France and Belgium, were in a similar position in this respect*