TAXING COMMERCIAL TRAVELLERS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5805, 24 February 1897, Page 2

TAXING COMMERCIAL TRAVELLERS.

Australian newspapers, in commenting on the tax levied by the New Zealand Government on commercial travellers from outside countries, have ignored the fact that the fixed tax of £50 a year was imposed nt the request of the commercial houses themselves, in jH'eference to the inquisitorial income tax, under which they would bo compelled to disclose the extent of their New Zealand business. The newspapers' diatribes against the tax are therefore only calculated to betray their own ignorance of the circumstances. It may also be pointed out that such a tax is not so experimental and unprecedented as our critics assert. In the course of an article in last month's Contemporary Review, Mr E. J. Dillon incidentally mentions that an identical tax was last year imposed in Norway and Sweden, whero Teutonic " bagmen " had been doing a great business with articles "made in Germany." In both countries a tax of about <£60 a year has been imposed by the Legislature on all foreigners travelling in the interests of non-Scandinavian firms. As nine-tenths of the commercial travellers in the joint kingdom are Germans, this measure was naturally regarded as aimed at Germany, and reprisals were called for and expected. The passport system was to be made more stringent, and other difficulties were to be thrown in the way of Swedes and Norwegians travelling in the Fatherland. According to Mr Dillon, however, the Swedish Press took the matter up, showed that the German competition was unfair, and got respectable German merchants to endorse the statement. The circumstances supply a fairly close parallel to the case of New Zealand. The difference is that, whereas with us the tax is part of our recognised system, it is in the Scandinavian case a special impost designed to protect local industry and trade.