LOCAL BODY BORROWING

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 978, 22 May 1930, Page 15

LOCAL BODY BORROWING

INDEBTEDNESS TREBLES IN 10 YEARS BUSINESS MEN ALARMED | Members of the Auckland Chamber of Commerce are disturbed by the magnitude of local body indebtedness in New Zealand. The Parliamentary and Taxation ! Committee of the chamber has been investigating, and has found that the gross indebtedness of local authorities is now approximately £68,000,000, as compared with only £50,000,000 for the whole of Australia. In view of what has happened in Commonwealth finance the chamber feels that the people of this country should be acquainted with the situation. In its inquiries the chamber referred to the recent report of the Research Committee of the Auckland branch of the Economic Society of Australia and New Zealand drawing attention to the phenomenal growth of local body indebtedness in New Zealand during the last decade. This represented virtually a trebling of the debt since 1919. The Parliamentary and Taxation Committee recommended that the chamber should ventilate the figures with the request that publicity be given them, and that the attention of the Local Authorities Loans Board be directed to the growing debt. A SILVER LINING Pointing out that publication of figures which, in themselves, conveyed little, might do a great deal of harm, Mr. C. F. Bennett moved that the committee’s report be deferred for a month pending a fuller statement. He felt that only the gloomy side had been given. A lot was heard of the regard overseas’ investors had for New Zealand, and much was said of the buoyant state of the Dominion’s finances. If a one-sided statement of indebtedness got abroad the credit of the country might be harmed. Mr. A. G. Lunn: You want a silver lining ? Mr. Bennett: That is so. We ought to set forth what this indebtedness represents. Put to the vote Mr. Bennett’s motion was lost on the casting vote of the chairman, Mr. Malcolm Stewart. He was of opinion that publicity would do no harm.