ON THE ROAD TO SOCIALISM, SAYS LEGAL MAN

Stratford Evening Post, Volume II, Issue 23, 19 August 1932, Page 4

ON THE ROAD TO SOCIALISM, SAYS LEGAL MAN

STATE'S ENTRY INTO BUSINESS CONDEMNED TAXPAYING PUBLIC RAPIDLY DIMINISHING "New Zealand, to-day, is suffering from over-taxation arising through huge Government and local government expenditure both as regards loan expenditure and administratkm, stated Mr. Alfred Coleman "in'an interview witn the , Stratford Evening Post to-day. Between 1921 and 1931 the local government debt increased from £26,000,000 to £65,000,000, said Mr. Coleman. The Government public debt also increased tremendously. Interest and sinking fund payments have to be found in respect of this indebtedness and the taxpayer has to foot the bill. The State and Municipalities are now engaging so much in trade and in. dustry that they are competing seriously with private enterprise and absorbing a large number of people—who would otherwise be engaged in private enterprise—into the ranks.of the State's servants. The logical result of course is that there are fewer private enterprises making profits and fewer taxpayers from whom income tax and other taxation can be collected to meet the State's indebtedness. . • In other words the State Is now largely employed in fighting its own citizens and, as the State and the municipalities pay little or no taxation in respect of their enterprises, the whole of the taxation has to be found by the rapidlydiminishing number of fjtlzens who are engaged in private bust- i ness, pointed out Mr. Coleman. .

And now the question comes: What does it profit the State to flght and compete with its own taxpaying citizens? This seems to have been entirely lost sight of. For the past 30 years New Zealand has, without any break or cessation whatever, been travelling on the road to Socialism, but the progress has. been so gradual that the people have hardly realised the fact. It is obvious, however, that the present state of things cannot be allowed to continue, and a determined effort must be made to encourage the expansion of private enterprise and diminish in every way possible by a gradual but carefully thought out process the activities of the State, outside the proper functions of Government. There are, primarily, the matters of national defence, the preservation of law and order and public health.