PICTURE SHOWS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIV, Issue 22, 20 August 1917, Page 7

PICTURE SHOWS.

—.— -«&; i CHAMPIONED BY MR PAYNE. I The Government should not put the i picture show people in the position of having to put up their prices and stick up the working man at the door . for Government taxes Id on (id, said I Mr J. Payin', M. P., for Grey Lynn, in the course of the Financial Debate, lin the House of Representatives on Friday night. The average picture show running under the proposed tax conditions, contended Mr Payne, would have lost £2OO last year; and if lion, members did not realise that the picture shows had drawn peoplpe 1 from puidichojnso.s boys from telling smutty yarns at street corners, girls from adventures in the parks, and | their parents from their troubles, i they ought to realise it, and not kill the picture shows. Mr J. A. Young (Waikato); “ft isn’t to kill the | shows, but to raise revenue.” Mr | Payne: “Yes, hut yon should look at j the result of it.” They should not put the shows in the position of haying to pass the tax oit to the worker, he added, and they should not put the big picture s' ow trusts in the position of being able to put every other picture show out of business by not raising their prices, by not passing the tax on, while the smaller shows could not afford no‘. in pass it on. The shows, he urged, should be taxed on their profits rather than on their tickets.