PUBLIC FINANCE.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 74, Issue 114, 16 May 1931, Page 1 (Supplement)

PUBLIC FINANCE.

I Although the latest Bulletin issued I by the Canterbury Chamber of Commerce is forbiddingly and unuecessar- | ily long, it is to be hoped that nobody will be deterred from working through it to the conclusions. They aro of j serious importance; but perhaps t.ie inferences to be drawn from them are still more important. We may draw attention to a single point, which, j when the Minister for Finance is nl- | ready preparing to produce his Bulget, must be considered crucial. M% Forbes has informed the public that at east £2.250,000 must still be fouud. before the Budget can be balanced—perhaps it may oe as much as £3,000.000, or even more: and he has sail that increases of taxation will be unavoidable. But the increasing slug gishness of revenue and the effect uf. 'the price-fall in n cueing capac ; ty co I pay provide grave warnings, which tho Bulletin emphasises. It doubts whether the Government can “by any reasonable means increase its revenue for j 1931-32, as the increases in the rates J of taxation might be more than com--1 pensated by contraction bt the source, and it is practically certain that any I increases imposed arc likely to do more harm than good to the national income las a whole.” It would be foolish optimism to wave the doubt aside or discount the “practical certainty” of 1 the vicious effect of heavier taxation. , What follows, then, is what has frequently been urged in The Press. The I Government must make still more ! strenuous efforts to reduce expendiI lure —the Bulletin suggests that “the I public finances can no longer be mado I to carry their burden of recent years’* i —and if efforts along the lines so far ! followed will not produce sufficiently i useful results, then different lines of I attack must be followed. It is often ! said that the greater part of State exi penditure is controlled by Statute, and it is; but if the Statute Book calls on the country to spend more than it can afford—actually more than it has to spend—then it is folly to baulk at the line which leads to revision of tho Statute Book. In other words, when the country is being financially crip* | pled by the social policy laid down in j Acts of Parliament, the time has cornu ito modify the policy.—Christchurch ‘ Press. I