Tonga

“Rainy Days” In

Taxpayers Want Some Relief

Letter to the Editor IN all discussions upon the stability or otherwise of Tongan Government finances, no opportunity is ever allowed to pass, on the part of pro-Government de baters, of referring to the Surplus. This Surplus was accumulated in better times than the present by the simple expedient of budgetting for more revenue than was necessary to cover the expenditure. That is to say, by imposing taxes to bring in more than was being paid out.

When enquirers asked for what purpose the Surplus was being accumulated, re sponsible Government spokesmen replied that it was for a “rainy day.” The natural inference from such a reply was that, if and when such time happened upon the country as to fit the description of a metaphorical “rainy day,” the taxpayers might look to the Government for some relief in the burden of their monetary obligations through recourse to the Sur plus. No such relief has ever been at tempted, although the “rainy day” has turned into a deluge.

Whatever may have been the declared object in setting aside sums of money now amounting to £135,000. the taxpayers have had increased burdens imposed on them during very recent years, and in years in which the prosperity of the country and the individual has suffered a marked de cline. The expenditure of the Government during the last four or five years has been kept up to figures out of all proportion to the taxpayers’ capacity to pay, with the apparent intention of making up any shortage out of the Surplus. Thus apply ing the principle of the “rainy day” not to the relief of the taxpayer, but to the main tenance of what everybody outside the Government recognizes as a very expensive and rather unavailing organization.

I am, etc.,

Theban.

Nukualofa, Tonga, May 31, 1934.