THE INCOME TAX.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXVIII, Issue 7979, 6 March 1906, Page 5

THE INCOME TAX.

AN UNUSUAL CASE. PALMERSTON N., March 5. Lissaman, a local chemist, was fined £2 and costs, 28s, for refusing to allow the income tax officer to examine a book. The defendant said he had filled in his returns to the Department 1 " to the best of his ability, and he looked upon the presence of an officer of the Department, under the circumstances, as* an insult. He also, wished io protest, as an Englishman, against the intolerable tyranny, and the indignity placed upon a man by such a law which he bad no idea of, and could not understand how it had been framed. A person might just as well be in Russia. The S. M. j suggested that everyone might not be as honest aa Mr Lissaman io their returns. The Department might be defrauded, and that, no doubt, was the object of the authority given. The position taken up by the defendant in the matter was quite wrong and the fcooks should have been produced. The penalty provided was not less than £2, and not more than £IOO, so that it was possible that a oase like this might be very serious. In reply to the Court, Mr Clarke, Income Tax officer, said this was the first case of this nature brought By the Department.