Chapter I. New Zealand Deficit.

Two years have passed since the public were told on the hustings (Nov., 1875) that a deficit was coming upon New Zealand. The papers, being owned by politicians, who had their own purposes—dishonest purposes—to serve, suppressed the speech, but, thanks to the kindness of an independent proprietor, certain portions were detailed piecemeal through the columns of the Globe, and then the astonished public learnt a few faint outlines of a reform needful in the highest degree in every part of the Government machinery in New Zealand. The Government adopted same of the most trivial reforms, but totally neglected the most useful, namely, the monetary and taxation reforms; arguments, facts, biting satire, were thrown away upon them, and we have been plunged by the great K.C.M.G. and his ignorant followers into a very serious mess. "What else could be expected? That a gallant Major, untrained but to war, should plunge into hot financial war—that an ex-policeman (now the Hon. C. C. Bowen), untrained in commerce, venturing his rash hand on the helm of State, ignorant of financial starboard! or port! should steer our gallant ship on to the wild rocks of deficits! twenty-three million loans! false taxation! and national insolvency!

What else could be expected from a Parliament mainly composed of a medley of fill trades and professions, skilled in talk, unskilled in finance, openly complaining that "they cannot understand the accounts;" or, as the Hon. E. W. Stafford so pitifully says, "the accounts are only intelligible to experts."

The following figures are taken from the Financial Statement given to the House, and are only corrected so as to exclude the loans that cover from view the real deficit. The public, by a little patient examination, will understand them, and will see that instead of a surplus there is a deficiency:— page 6

Year's Receipts to 30th June, 1877.

	£.	s.	d.
Customs Duties, &c.	1,199,378	15	0
Customs Bonded Stores	5,536	19	2
Customs Fees, Light dues	15,806	3	10
Pilotage, Harbour dues	4,940	2	0
Stamps	122,670	18	9
Post	86,547	14	0
Telegraph	63,983	13	1
Law	41,982	13	3
Registration Land	13,646	15	5
Registration Deeds	16,482	12	6
Registration Births	4,757	3	9
Registration Crown Grants	4,053	14	9
Sheep Fees and Fines	3,548	8	6
Miscellaneous Fees	3,694	15	3
Incidental Receipts	27,552	0	3
Total (8, B2)	£1,614,582	10	3
Deficiency carried to Deficit Account	145,302	19	5
	£1,759,885	9	8

Year's Payments to 30th June, 1877.

The manner adopted by the Prime Minister to conceal this deficit is highly objectionable. First, he says, we terminate the year on 30th Tune, and so we must not count outstanding accounts, though at page 16, B2, he says the outstanding liabilities of the Province are £259,556, and at page 4 he states the Bank overdraft of four provinces is £106,268. But worse, he gets money on Bank overdraft, uses up the whole of our Reserve of £800,000 Imperial Guarantee, issues Treasury Bills, puts all these down as Receipts, when he knows very well he has only staved off the evil day for a few months, and says, I have a surplus; the Bank Ledger is proof." The House failed to see that blunder. How can two Bank Ledgers, showing over a million overdraft, due in 1878 and 1879, show a surplus. That was childish. His own confession contradicts himself, when he tells the House (page 16) that we must raise more money to release the Imperial Debentures.

And a balance to be placed to Rail renewals.

The Ministry perhaps think that the London Stock Exchange has no more perception of the real state of things than they have themselves; but to candid men I say the Stock Exchange did right to refuse your 4,000,000 loan, which a Jew broker took up; they did right to refuse the 1876 loan, which the Bank did at 5 per cent.; it is a real kindness to New Zealand, an endeavour to open your eyes, to show that, however false the conclusions given to you, however corrupt your minds may be, however ignorant you are as a nation, they at least will not aid page 9 and abet your wrongful wishes. To them, as to me, the actual position of the Ministry is £823,431—deficit covered by bills and overdrafts; no talk, no ocean of babbling lawyers' tongues will alter the awful fact. To them, as to me, it is a solid fact that your Railways last year were a dead loss of £455,702, and that you took it out of the poor and let the rich, who got the Railways, pay nothing at all. To them, as to me, it will be plain that the Government whip put up Mr. Woolcock to sound the House about Taxation, and tricked the unwary members into a declaration against present Taxes, that their rich friends might feast on the poor for another year. To them, as to me, it is plain that the whole Parliament made a gross blunder, that the true amendment was—"That the question of Taxation shall be considered when the Committee are considering Ways and Means." Had I been there I should have moved that.

The Government propose to borrow two millious more! Where? London is deaf! What will you do? Bankruptcy! Sale of Railways! What will you do? Stop all works! Seize Land Fund! Stop all the subsidies! Pray to Sir Julius, who is the real author of your troubles! Anything, I suppose, except the good old plan—"Trust in God, and keep your powder dry;" or, to say the very same thing in other words,—"Work out your own salvation while God works it for you."

Chapter II. Taxation of Workers, and Freedom of Real and Personal Estates.

The Tariff is not protection, and it is a heavy burden on work. The political ignorance shewn at the last adjustment by Sir J. V. of the New Zealand Tariff is so great as hardly to be believed. I have now to establish the fact that the workers have been paying the interest on Railways while those landowners, and foreign firms who get all the benefit pay nothing; but worse has to come.

A dissection of the Tariff gives the following blunders by which we are prevented from starting Colonial Industries :—

Steel, 1s. per cwt.—The machinery made from it, free

Leather, ½d. and 1d. per 1b.—Goods made from it, 10 per cent. Axles, arms and boxes, 10 per cent.—Some goods made from them, free.

Tools, 10 per cent.—Some goods made of them, free.

The following blunders as raising the price of wages and preventing Colonial production—such are necessaries of Life or Trade not manufactured here:— page 10

• Arrowroot, ½ or 10 per cent.
• Baking Powder, 10 per cent.
• Bellows, 10 per cent.
• Blacking, 10 per cent.
• Brushes
• Buckets
• Cement Plaster
• Chocolate
• Cocoa
• Coffee
• Combs
• Cotton Goods
• Drapery
• Glass
• Hemp Goods
• Hardware
• Holloware
• Horseshoes
• Lamps
• Lasts
• Leadpipe
• Linen Goods
• Maccaroni
• Maizena
• Millinery
• Nails
• Oils
• Paper, writing, bags, wrapps Paints
• Pearl Barley, Peas, Pepper
• Pitcn
• Rice
• Rope
• Saltpetre
• Starch Blue
• Stationery, Account Books
• Steel
• Sulphur
• Shingles, Palings
• Tea, 6d. per 1b.
• Tacks
• Tar
• Tapioca
• Tartaric Acid
• Tools
• Twine
• Turpentine
• Varnish
• Vermicelli
• Vinegar
• Whiting
• Woodware
• Zinc

How can the workers work their work if the food, clothes, and tools are all taxed, while the rich by absenteeism escape, and also while goods made elsewhere are positively admitted free of duty—thus we punish ourselves twice over, once by preventing the men from making goods, twice by letting foreigners enter goods free.

The alteration of the Tariff on these, if supplemented by an excise on beer and spirits, would be possible.

There is not a farthing paid for landed or personal property towards the Government of this nation.

There are 12,500,000 acres sold, which were valued by Mr. Woolcock at £2 per acre, £25,000,000; but it is surely worth £5 per acre, much of it is worth £20 and £25 per acre.

So we have 8,000,000 held by 112 people at £5—£40,000,000. About 5,000,000 held by others at £5—£25,000,000.

Now the interest on Railways should be made to fall partly on these because they really receive the whole value—yet no tax is levied on these; while by a strange infatuation the Prime Minister actually wants to charge the fresh purchasers of distant lands with the whole interest on the cost of Railways, and so to page 11 deprive them of the power to make roads and bridges. Quatenus, heu nefas! The personal estate, consisting of foreign companies, banks, long leaseholds, foreign firms, interest of mortgage loans, &c., &c., say seventy millions, escapes taxation.

But taxes Nos. 3, 5, and 6 need not be put on at present unless we fail to raise another two millions.

You will be astonished to see that in New Zealand (1) the persons holding property to the value of £135,000,000 having got the representation of the people into their hands have so arranged matters as to pay no taxes at all on their property.

2. That the working men enumerated there—from servants up to the judges—pay nearly all the taxes, while rich absentees pay nothing at all.

3. That an immense amount of capital trades here making 15 and 20 per cent., and pays nothing at all.

4. That I propose a heavy tax on these who, through the painful ignorance of Sir J. Vogel and the Ministry, have taken millions of our money without paying towards our Government, but in the statement I have shown the drones who' don't pay.

5. To the eternal disgrace of the Philosophical Institute of New Zealand they have paid more attention to beetles than to men, and there are no proper statistics of New Zealand for future historians.

6. Instead of the profit on Railways, stated by the Hon. H. Atkinson, there is a dreadful loss of over £450,000 the year; but the worst is that this heavy sum, though paid by workers, is positively all put in the value of the country estates who pay positively nothing at all to the Interest on Railways—hence the loss should be charged by means of income and property tax on those who get the benefit of it.

7. Instead of a surplus on the year there is a deficit of £145,000; besides the other amounts entered altogether making £563,881 1s. 8d.; and there are Provincial Liabilities out £259,556. Present deficit, £823,433 1s. 8d. This has been covered up by bills and loans and overdrafts, as appears in the Sketch Budget.

Chapter III. Land Fund Misappropriated.

Cost of Surveys to be paid by this fund.

Has the Central power any right to meddle with it?—No; only to collect cost of surveys from each Board; to collect and distribute subsidies and Immigration.

What is the present position of the Laud Fund?—It is a Jack-in-the-box, to pop up continually among the crowd of ignorant talkers, as a nice method of securing votes, bribing whole districts, and upsetting all sound Government.

How is this done?—Auckland got three millions to buy a Land Fund. Mr. Reader Wood said, in his place in the House, he could not find out where the money had gone to, but Auckland has no Laud Fund, Canterbury has,—and so it is a continual quarrel, in which the other districts get mixed up, and a general mess is the result.

What is the real cause of the Deficit?—The Land Fund! For if the Parliament could be made to put it away properly, and forget it, by being forced to consider other questions on their merits, they would long ago have settled the whole of the Deficit on a proper basis.

There are eight million acres held by 112 people, while the remaining five million acres are held by small holders.

Ought there to be a limit fixed for holdings?—Yes; no one ought to hold more than 500 acres.

Why?—The holders of large estates do not cultivate them to the full extent, the country loses the produce of its soil; the holders are also encouraged to lead useless lives of luxury and indulgence, and to become a gentlemanlike curse, or a ladylike misery to the nation.

Is this the time to fix a limit?—Yes; every day that this great matter is neglected it becomes a greater hardship; indeed, it savours of rank injustice, to first encourage a man to buy, and then to force him to sell.

Can it be conveniently done without compensation Yes; fix a limit now, and put on a sliding scale land tax, such as would burst up the large properties.

page 13

Who should control the Land Fund?—Each Road Board should sell its own land, pay to the New Zealand Ordnance Survey Department the cost of survey of such sales, and appropriate the proceeds in thirds, as explained.

Should Education fall on the land?—It was suggested years ago that Reserves should be made in small blocks throughout the nation, and be let, and, on the rents, moneys be raised to build schools, that posterity might partly bear the burden of their buildings.

Are Counties, as formed, likely to be of use?—Certainly not; they are only fit to be broken up into little Road Boards.

Chapter IV. Railways a Loss Wrongly Charged.

Who paid this heavy loss?—The workers.

Whatever the ultimate fate of the Railways may be, it is certain that for years past the Foreign firms, Loan Companies, and so forth have been very largely profiting by them, and have not only not paid any taxes towards them, but have positively seen, without a murmur, the whole burden of that loss laid upon the wages fund and the industry of the nation. In the chapter on Taxation, it was shown that the ignorance that compiled our Tariff and settled the interest on Railways was so great as to be hardly credible. Surely it is worse to do, as the Prime Minister does, to say we have a profit on the Railways; it is satisfactory to see the productive nature of the expense, when the real truth is that if the actual interest (paid on them since the first sod was turned) and compound interest were charged we should be amazed to see millions lost. Really, after all, the fiscal riddle lies just there. New Zealand is heavily taxed; we groan under it. Loans, while spending, relieve, to fall the more heavily afterwards; and when a Ministry can cover deficit with more loans, pay interest with loans, and then refuse to tax the property that gets the benefit, it must be they adopt the motto—après nous le dèluge.

Chapter V. Colonial Industry and Free Trade.

Colonial Industry is severely damaged by it, for the workmen are not only punished by heavy taxes on food, medicine, and clothes, but foreign manufactures are admitted free.

Now, here are ten branches of Trade, and if it be right to protect one trade, it is right to protect all, and so, in order to secure protection, the nation protected has to go into the market with its purchasing power heavily lessened by taxes, and each branch has to pay £9 to its fellows for its protection of £1 to itself. The fault of this demonstration nobody ever touched—it lies in the word "pay;" money passed to foreign nations is "pay;" money circulated in our own is not "pay," it is only exchange.

The other theory is best shown by algebraic formula.

• M is the Manufacturing class
• C is the Food and Clothes growers
• N is the Nation
• F is Free Trade
• P is Protection
• O is Bad Economypage 15
• X is Good Economy
• R is Riches made in the Nation
• S is Strange Riches
• A is Ratio

Our first formula is—

If M > C then N F=X ∵ C ∠ M ∴ C cannot feed and clothe M. Now, as N has to live by manufacture, and not to live by farming, it would be ruined by Protection. Therefore, converse of first formula, if M > C then N P=O.

Second formula—

But if C > M then N P=X ∵ C > M ∴ C can support M, and C will be ruined by Free Trade; or, converse of second formula, if C > M then N F=O.

Third formula (a corollary)—

C > M requires N P=X ∵ N+R=X, and ∵ N−R=O, while it is clear to everbody that if C > M, and you dare to insist on N F=X that C > M N F=N−R=O is the ruinous result.

Fourth formula (further corollary)—

R makes R is a law, that gives a differential progression; thus, suppose R circulate in N four times at 10 per cent, then C > M NP=X=N+R+4A³, with compound results.

Fifth Formula—

If M > C N F=X ∵ N+E+S ∵ M > C ∴ N+E+S is the only possible condition of X.

Sixth formula is the great one for Now Zealand, being, of course, the converse of fifth formula—

If C > M then N P=X ∵ N M > C must beg food and clothes at the doors of N C > M, and N M > C must feed and clothe on their manufactures, so now the cumulative formula becomes—If C > M then N P=X=N+R+S+ times A times—1+years+interest+compound interest.

So the riddle is solved. Free Trade is not an intrinsic truth, but only a result of conditions. Reverse the conditions, the result is reversed. One man's food is another man's poison, multiply a divisior you divide the quotient, these are principles known and admitted, they have application in Protection and Free Trade. How to convey these thoughts in all their truth to such dark minds as those of the men who constructed the New Zealand Tariff, viz., Sir J. Vogel, Hon. C. C. Bowen, Major Atkinson, Hons. E. W. Stafford, Fox, &c., Sir W. Fitzherbert included? That is the question? The Marquis of Hartington said the other day that the Pacific Colonies and America were taking up the exploded theories of protection, and he expected to see the British artisans presently do the same. Mr. John Bright said that Victoria would find out that Protection was ruinous, except partial to protect Colonial Industry. These men err greatly. The have never weighed the conditions, Instinct is a page 16 better guide than reason. It teaches the burnt child (who cannot understand combustion) to dread the fire.

The Profanum Vulgus must accept the conclusion. The interests of England and her colonies are diametrically opposite to each other, by virtue of opposing intrinsic fundamental conditions, and my simple formulae, which the world connot upset, prove that New Zealand, Australia, Canada, America, Africa, &c., have interests opposed to Britannia.

Protection of the coast should be by sea. New Zealand has a coast line, that is impossible of land defence. Volunteer torpedo brigades in all the principal ports, and naval guns on snore, suitable for immediate fitting to swift steamers, these are better than land forces. In the estimates the Budget figures are reduced to £100,000, on the assumption of the disbanding of all land forces, and the subtitution of the above means, cheaper and more efficient as they really are.

Chapter VI. Representation a Farce.

Property has secured all the votes, and is thus able to put in "politicians," men who, ignorant of the fact that sound economy is really the best thing for property itself, and that to sin against true politics is only to punish property, yet persist blindly in taking the revenue out of the wages fund of the country, thereby preventing production, while on the other hand they positively allow millions of profit to be taken from the country by loan companies, such as the New Zealand Loan, &c; by banks whoso shareholders are in London; by insurance companies whose owners do not work for their income. So that as I have shown in the personal estate seventy millions of money earning about five and a half millions a year pay no taxes, while the Representatives charge on to the backs of the people the whole of the cost of the Railways.

Is that representation? Have the grocers, the shopkeepers, the clerks, the labourers, the civil servants no better judgment than to elect men guilty of the greatest financial errors that it is possible to conceive?

How true it is that for all the good they do it were bettor for some politicians that a millstone were hanged about their necks and they should have been cast into the depths of the sea than live to stand and defile the page of history with ignorance so profound, with a policy of spoliation, a policy of denudation, a policy mother to every ill.

Oh! Zealandia! my young country! You lie trampled under the merciless heels of a crowd of mammon worshippers, whose god is the golden calf, whose ambition is cash, and whose history is a dirge of sorrow.

For one moment I turn from abstract truth to the persons representing this borough of Christchurch that holds my carcase (but not my soul). Mr. Stevens, a man who makes his bread and cheese out of foreign capitalists, is a representative. Look at his speech on the Income Tax (Hansard, page 625); he tells you such taxes would frighten capital away. What is 1s. 6d. in the £ on an income of 15 per cent.? Why it is only £ 1 2s. 6d. out of the profit. And does Mr. Stevens really think that London men would refuse to make £ 15 per cent, because they would be taxed £1 2s. 6d. out of it? That would leave them £13 17s. 6d. net profit; or, out of £8 per cent., £7 8s. net profit. Ignorance again!

Mr. Richardson is one of Sir Julius Vogel's friends, and he helped to put all this burden on the people : it is useless to argue with such a mind.

New Zealand should take care to avoid the influentials, the merchants, the runholders' friend, &c., get some candidates of a certain platform fixed by the electors—pledge their candidates to go up and tax incomes of foreigners.

Till that is done Representation will be a farce.

Payemnts (see 9—B2).

Chapter VII. Budget to 30th June, 1878, as it Ought to be. Based on the Figures Given by the Prime Minister.

Here the facts given by Major Atkinson are used to show how the legal and fiscal principles laid down in this essay on Government should be applied. The great essential differences between the two Budgets are—I make a Rail Tax on the rural lauds that have been already doubled in value by the rails; he lets them go free.

I allow the Road Boards their Land Fund, subject to one-third, to give subsidies to Boards and Boroughs that need assistance, and subject to one-third for bringing in farm labourers and girls.

I charge the Rail interest on the rails; he charges it on the poor labourer, on the trader, on anybody he can get hold of, except the right man, the property holder, that is brought to town by rails.

I charge personal property with the charities and education, and make it contribute. He has always, and still will, let estate go free.

My budget is a real surplus of half a million towards the deficit; his, if the truth be told, means loss of subsidies, Land Fund, and wages fund, and a further deficit, and ruinous taxes; no charity, no education fund, and, if he cannot get two millions, no New Zealand.

Choose you this day (not next year) whom you will serve—yourselves or the Foreign Bondholders.

Conclusion.

Now, friend readers, farewell; may we never meet again on such a topic; never again to draw that grinning skeleton out of the cupboard of the New Zealand nation. Scotch it! bury it! put an end to it! The principles that have cost me so much toil and pain to win from the land of the unknown for you, take them, teach them to your children. Work them out! Save yourselves and this splendid country from the fangs of the merciless tools who dare to assume the name of politicians.

Oh! you, the rich! Cease your greed! Dare to be generous! Let the world, delighted, see you fix to your lust for land a bound, a limit; learn of the heathen—

Intactis opulentior
Thesauris Aral'm' et divitis Indiae,
Caementis licet occupcs
Tyrrhen' m' omne ink et mar' Apulicum
* * * non animum metu, Non mortis layueis expedies caput,

Let these large estates be broken up, and the historian of the future, grateful child of ours, shall inscribe your names upon his lasting page—"The Fathers of the Country."

In presenting those bold outlines of the truths I have worked out for my country, I appeal from the facts to all calm, reasonable men. I have not striven to vilify my opponents, but only to expose their ignorance. Indeed it is hardly reasonable to put a largo Life Insurance Company, a Bank, a Railway Company, a Telegraph Company into the hands of men like Major Atkinson, Messrs. Bowen, Ormond, and Whitaker, who, however excellent morally, have had no commercial training. When such companies are started privately, we select suitable persons from commerce; why then do we violate all common sense by attempting to make men do that which they do not understand, and for which they have acquired no previous fitness? With excellent motives, and great nobility of soul, their ignorance, added to that of Sir Julius Vogel, has nearly brought ruin on this splendid country.

To the Marquis of Normanby : Sir,—To you, as the impartial umpire of the destinies of Now Zealand, I submit my work.

To the members of both Houses, I have to say that in this discussion I have put aside all malice and envy, and I ask the same treatment for my work. In pointing out the errors into which you have all fallen, I have done so from a mathematical point of view, losing the persons in the question. I have not striven to kindle the flame of popular passion; it entangles these questions, and hazes them. But you must admit it is high time, when the Ministry have such a skeleton in the cupboard, to pull it out and take it to pieces. I boast no wishes, but leave my work to work.

To the London Stock Exchange: Gentlemen,—It is now 20 years since I sailed down old Father Thames, and the six years that I spent in your Honourable House are a pleasant treasure of my memory. The statement here put forth—you, I know, can judge better than the New Zealand nation,—it is the truth. Accustomed to laugh at politicians, and to deal in politics, to weigh loans and securities, I have followed the lessons taught to me by you. and the sum of my examination is—that New Zealand, with an entire fiscal reform, and with sound political economy, is one of the greatest and richest nations of the earth.

New Zealand, under her present rulers, is deficit, £825,000. Yearly loss—rails, £450,000; Loans, £21,000,000.

Wanted £2,000,000 More!

Wanted, also, places for place-hunters! land for sharks! and honours for the vain-glorious!