FREEZING COMPANY PROTESTS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 10871, 11 September 1913, Page 3

FREEZING COMPANY PROTESTS.

INCREASED INCOME TAX CONDEMNED.

"SERIOUS CLOG ON INDUSTRIAL

PROGRESS." [Pkr Pres? Association.] WANGANTTI, September 10. At the annual meeting of the Wangantii Meat Freezing Company strong exception was taken to the proposal of the Government to impose graduated income tax on the company's profits. The proposal was condemned as iniquitous, as tlio profits of a freezing company were a fluctuating quantity. It was that in 1909 the Waiiganui Freezing Company had made a loss of £15,000, but that in the following year, when a profit was made, there could be no set-oft, but income tax must be paid on the full amount of that year's earning. It was stated that the Minister had been approached on this, and no satisfaction had been obtained. A suggestion was also made that the fairest way to levy income tax was over an average period of five years, but the meeting could not understand why a Parliament containing more farmers than any previous one should inflict such a tax on the meat freezing industry. The following motion was carried unanimously : ''That this meeting enters an emphatic protest against the Government's proposals to increase the in-

come tax payable by companies, and views such proposals with alarm as a serious clog on industrial progress." The Wanganui Meat Freezing Company last year made a profit of £IO.SII, and a 5 per cent dividend, representing £2500, has been declared, £6OOO carried to the reserve fund and the balance carried forward. The company has ever £21,000 in cash or on short call deposits, and has reduced its outside liabilities by £19,600 during the. last two years.