Lord Decies, on behalf of the Income Taxpayers' Society, has
called attention to Sir Robert Home's statement that at the end of May the arrears of income-tax amounted to £64,000,000. The arrears were half as large again as in June, 1921, and twice as large as in 1920.. The reason is, of course, that the limit of taxable capacity has been outrun by an insatiable Treasury, and that the patient taxpayer, habitually punctual in meeting his obligations to the State, can no longer do so. The Inland Revenue authorities are not to blame. They show full consider- ation to the hard-pressed citizen, so far as the law permits. The fault lies with the Government, who have been wantonly extravagant and will not even yet recognize that the revenue in these hard times- is not elastic and that taxes, like the cultivation of land, are subject to the law of diminishing returns and, when raised beyond a certain point, cease to be productive. The revenue must be fixed at a sum below that of the present Budget, and the expenditure must be brought within it. The partial failure of the income-tax is a sign of danger that even Ministers cannot overlook.
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