B.- l | Pt. ll],

not elected to make any such appointment. In both cases, too, the Audit Office may appoint an auditor outside its own staff to examine the accounts of authorized collectors, and it has elected to do so in the case of collections made for the National Patriotic Fund Board by a joint committee of the Y.M.C.A. and Salvation Army in connection with the Fighting Services Welfare Appeal, and by the Joint Council of the Order of St. John and New Zealand Red Cross Society in connection with the Sick, Wounded, and Distress Appeal. The National Patriotic Fund Board is authorized to make grants of money or gifts of chattels to or for the purpose of any approved fund, and, after consultation with the Audit Office, the Board agreed to impose the following conditions in respect of such grants or gifts : — (а) That organizations which receive money from the Board to provide capital assets, which assets become the property of the Board, shall account to the Board for their expenditure on such assets, and such expenditure shall be subject to audit by the Audit Office : (б) That organizations which receive moneys from the Board for the purpose of assisting to provide comforts and amenities for soldiers shall render accounts showing the net cost of making such provision, and that the Board will base its payments to the organization on such accounts. The National Patriotic Fund Board is the National Council for the Reclamation of Waste Material established by the Reclamation of Waste Material Emergency Regulations 1940, and the net proceeds of sales are to be distributed amongst the Provincial Patriotic Funds. The Council has established branches and depots throughout the Dominion, and has received, up to 30th June, 1941, some £6,000 from the sale of material. In terms of the regulations the Audit Office has audited the relative accounts. Funds relating to the war of 1914-18 are still held by a number of organizations whose accounts are audited by public accountants, and by the National Funds Council whose records are checked by the Audit Office. Departmental Balance-sheets. The revenue accounts and balance-sheets of Departments for the year 1939-40, prepared in terms of section 57 of the Finance Act, 1932, numbering some one hundred and ten, have been audited with the exception of two which are at present receiving attention. The books and accounts in general were found to be satisfactorily kept, and the audited accounts appear in parliamentary paper 8.-l [Pt. IV], Marketing Department Audit. When, on the outbreak of hostilities, all the resources of the Dominion for the supply of produce were made available to the British Government, the Export Division of the Marketing Department, which for a period of three years had been handling dairy-produce, became the nucleus of the organization necessary for undertaking the bulk purchase and disposal of all primary products. The Marketing Act, 1936, and the 1937 amending Act, authorized the Department to purchase and sell dairy-produce, fruit, honey, and eggs, and provided for the extension (by Order in Council) of the Department's activities to other foodstuffs. In 1939 a further amendment to the Marketing Act empowered the GovernorGeneral by Order in Council to authorize the Department to purchase and sell any specified goods, or goods of any specified classes, and on the issue of the necessary authority the Export Division of the Department undertook the purchase and disposal of commodities such as wool, meat, tallow, sheep-skins, and scheelite. The Export Division also entered into contracts for the supply to the War Office of New Zealand foodstuffs, mostly tinned products, for the forces in the Middle East and elsewhere.

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