THE BUDGET.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 76, Issue 105, 6 May 1933, Page 13 (Supplement)

THE BUDGET.

So accustomed has the public become to the idea of a national deficit that the announcement of a balanced Budget has come with a shock of surprise. It is certainly very cheering news that tho Government, after drawing £2,500,000 from reserves in accordance with its original plan, should have made ends meet. From a budgetary point of view the year was one of progressive improvement, for in October last the Prime Minister was able to state that tho prospective deficit had been reduced to half the earlier figure, and now Mr. Coates shows that the recovery in national finance was even greater in the last half of the financial year than in the first half. There was a late increase in revenue, and this must be due largely to the heavier taxation imposed in February on petrol, sugar, tobacco and gold. At the same time expenditure was reduced, but how much of the improvement is attributable to extra revenue and how much to economies is not yet know. Mr. Coates says that tho purchase of exchange from the banks cost th c Government £470,000, which is for a period of ten weeks to the end of the financial year. If that could be accepted as a basis for a year’s estimate, the annual charge would be over £2,400,000. More information is needed, however, before it can be taken as a fair basis. Another point on which more information is required is the effect of the sales tax. This probably would eo little to assist last year’s Budget, as only the revenue from direct importations by retailers would be received by tho Government before tho end of March, and the first payments of wholesalers and manufacturing retailers art just being collected. To the Government, turning its attention from the year which has ended to the one which must be faced, the sales tax will be the most productive now source of rev*» enue, and much will depend upon its capacity to support the current Budget. —Auckland Star