66

should (unless there were obvious objections to it) be subject to my approval.

Before laying before you the estimates of the revenue and expenditure for the current year, I have to call your attention to the very material difference between my estimate of last year’s revenue, and the actual receipts. The revenue was put down at £132,381, but amounted only to £122,236, showing a deficiency of £10,145. The explanation of this deficiency will, I think, be perfectly satisfactory to you. It arose from a sum of £4,000 due by the General Government on account of the maintenance of the Pencarrow Light, not having been recovered—from the sale of the Reclaimed Land, having only realised £3,000, instead of £10,000—and from the land sales, owing to the withdrawal from sale of the Manawatu lands, producing £4,400 less than my estimate. From almost all other sources, the receipts amounted to more than they were estimated at, and had it not been for the post-ponement of the Manawatu sale, there would have been, instead of a deficiency, a very considerable excess of receipts over my estimates.

Tracing the securities we hold of the General Government as cash, the balance to the credit of the Province on the 1st of April last, will be found to be £4,689. I estimate the three-eighths of the gross Customs revenue for present year, at £34,000; Licences, at £3,000; Pilotage, £1,500; Sheep Assessments, £850; Hospital and Lunatic Asylum, £200; Incidental Receipts (including deposits), at £4,000; Toll Bar, £1,780; Queen’s Wharf and Warehouse, £2,500; Rates, at £6,000; Proceeds of Reclaimed Land, £10,000; Sale of Wanganui Bridge Debentures, £10,000; Hawke’s Bay Interest, £2,500; Refunds of advances to General Government, £760; and the Territorial Revenue, at £46,000, making the total receipts, £129,769, an amount which it will be seen is wholly inadequate to meet the demands upon our finances—demands which must be met.

The ordinary expenses of the Government, which year by year are inevitably increasing, may in round numbers be stated at £21,000—of the Land Survey and Engineers’ Departments, at £12,400. The amount placed under the head of sundry undertakings—the principal items being for Education, Steam, and Cobb’s Coach Subsidies, and for the expenses of the Queen’s Wharf, &c., is £7,700; for Roads, £31,342. Under the head of sundry works, you will find votes proposed amounting in the aggregate to £41,284—the chief amounts being for Wanganui bridge, £12,000; wharf extension, £13,000; assisted immigration, £2,000; and contingencies for public works, £4,000. The permanent appropriation provided for by special Acts, amounts to £15,550; the total estimated expenditure is £129,276, against estimated receipts of £129,769. But in this estimate of expenditure no provision has been made for the £25,000 required for Manawatu purchase, or for the expenditure in reference to the reclaimed land, which will certainly not be less than £16,000 for the present financial year. As it is utterly impossible to provide for these amounts out of current revenue, I propose to raise by mortgage on security of the land in process of reclamation, a sum of from £15,000 to £20,000, and to ask you to authorise me to obtain a temporary loan from the Banks of the amount required for the Manawatu. But it must be borne in mind that as the advances obtained from the Banks will only be for a short period, and will have to be repaid from the proceeds of the land sales, we shall be compelled to restrict our expenditure as much as possible, and it may be necessary to postpone for a year or two the execution of many public works urgently required.

Though the statement of your financial position may, at the first glance, appear unsatisfactory, your financial prospects were never really so bright, for, as I have already stated, the land reclaimed at a cost of £26,000 will yield at least £55,000, and by the purchase of the Manawatu you secure a large territorial income for many years.

Looking to the marked and steady increase of the Customs’ duties, to the growing value of your exports, to the acquisition and opening up of new fields for population, to the realisation of public works and plans long contemplated, to the cessation of native troubles in this island, and to the impetus which that cessation must give to colonisation everywhere, and to the abundant evidences which you every day see around you of activity and prosperity, you cannot fail to permit me to congratulate you on the continued sound condition of the Province, for which you have again been summoned to legislate.

I. E. FEATHERSTON,
Superintendent.

Superintendent’s Office,
Wellington, 22nd May, 1866.

Printed under the authority of the Government of the Province of Wellington, by J. & E. Bull, Printers for the time being to such Government.