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FEBRUARY | u j # _ ® I No Use Complaining, | | Nothing Kise to Do. * e _ e _ _J. E. Coulter, general manager of SCY Fll'l'fl o{f'c""l | the Canadian Pacific Express'Com- r< pany, said he could not pass judg-- |' MOI\OY |8 NCQdCd lment on the measure un't)il hg ha'd had an opportunity to study it, but STUD | he, too, was inclined to philosophize. > Y E F F E CT S "We don't like paying these taxes | e ul tm [ani); more than any one else," he ¥ s «4 # | _ Officials of Ontario banking in-- d:,-p'- but is there anything else 40 ismutions. insurance houses and | . _ The increase from 2 per cent to other large corporations accepted ;iz:" °'i"t on flett i;comes of all or-- . word of propo orati ry incorporated companies was increases philp 5 edhimlrp 13 m"i ':" regarded as drastic by F. D. . Tok . ses philosophically last night.| -- chard, general manager of the Board Unable to predict the effect the of Trade, but he also qualified his measure would have on their busi| comment by adding that no final nesses until they comda study the °Pi"i°" could be expressed until the | bill in detail, most of them were in-- bill had been studied. clined to the view that, if the Gov-- '"The taxation committee of the ernument needed more money, there || board will be called ak soon as we was no use complaining. have full details," he said. "On the Insurance -- companies _ consoled face of it, the increase seems rather f themselves with the fact that On-- drastic, but it's pretty hard to ex-- tario taxes, even with the proposed press an opinion until we've had increases, were lower than those in | | * chance to look into it." : ' most other Provinces and, while : they disagreed with the prip.ciple of * taxing insurance premiums, they were prepared to meet the situation. Almost all large companies pre-- pared to hold board meetings Thurs-- \ day morning, at which the bill would be discussed fully and the probable effects of the measure studied. Until this had been done, | officials said, it would be impossible | j | to venture any opinions. | | G. Cecil Moore, managing direc-- | | tor of the Imperial Life Assurance ° | Company, did not believe the lax \was "a very drastic one." Insurance + companies had always looked to On-- tario to keep down taxation because they were already taxed too highly, * he said, but it was evidently a case of the Government needing money and there was not much the com-- panies could do about it. Sees It as Temporary. "Repeatedly we have had Gov-- ernment officials admit that our arguments are right," he said, "but their reply is always: 'We need more money; you have it; and 'you'ro going to be taxed whether you like it or not.'" ' | _ A. N. Mitchell, president of the | 'Canada Life Assurance Company, |subscribed to the same view. The fact that the tax was described as a "surtax," he said, seemed to indi« cate that it was being applied only as a temporary measure to meet an emergency situation. If such were the case, he believed, most com-- panies would be found willing to ; help out. I "Taxing insurance companies on | : their premiums collected," another | insurance official said, "is the same | thing as taxing bank deposits, be-- cause the cost must come back to' | the policyholder, whose premiums | are nothing more or less than sav-- | ings. It is a bad principle and On-- | tario Governments have recognized | that fact for years. That is why '\ they have kept the tax down so that it ranks among the lowest on this continent." The tax was not expected to have any serious effect upon the Bell' f Telephone Company, according to' one official. Because it operated | under a Dominion charter, he said, | o . it paid most of its taxes to Domin-! ion and municipal authorities. The amount paid to the Ontario treas-' ury was comparatively small. |