Canton, Oct. 13.
It has pretty near come to a pass where the government cannot longer continue to farra out the gathering: vf taxes, for many and biter are the protests and complaints of the treatment which those who have to pay receive st the hands of the monopolists.
Recently it was the restaurant keepers who were making things hot for the private company that was trying to squeeze out the last Orop of blood. Now it is the night soil coolies who are raving and ranting because they frocsee loss of em= ployment with the coming into being of a monopolist, whereas since time immemorial various private concerns have bought and disposed. of this refuse.
The General Chamber of C merce has come out strongly against the practice of farming out tax collecting rights, and at the Provineial Council Meeting on the 8th the proposal that the government. should henceforward gather its taxes itself was to have been cussed pro and con. That it tive question, and one that, hi deeply stirred the mai cannot be gain said, but the Provincial Council passed the matter by without offering any excuse for so doing when it meet on Friday last.
Canton's restaurant proprietors rendered a signal service to. the public in holding out as they did against the exactions of the franchise holder, for they laid bare the huge profits that he has been reap-Far over 100 per cent, is virtually all of there copie, who are the only ones to benefit to any vast extent by their existence, for the government col~ Iects a mere fraction of what is taken away from One by one the have been going back to work, for the present concessionaire is Wound to re engage their services, the new hands hired as strike-break-turning out most unsatisfactory fon the whole, Within three days, the General Chamber of Commerce has asked, the Commissioner of Public Health must have all night soil cleared. away. Places must, be appointed by the authorities where pablic dumping is allowed until stich time as the coolies have caught up with their work. And the General Chamber feels that the new concessionaire should not have the exclusive privilege of collecting:
but the government has de-stopeed this third demand, In this connection, it is worth while noting that" the greatest obstacle in the way of the cancel lation of all these tax collection ces is the retention of 0 many higher-ups by those who have axe to grind. It was stated that the restaurant owners had to pay jack to the restaurant tax. monopolist what he had paid to certain influential individuals before he sould secure his franchise, And so it goes on. Too many of these go~ betweens have had their palms oiled, and are pledged to fight for the wionopolists, and they exert too much "pull" on the inside to allow of a radical change being made, Another tax is to be that signboards, Ever so many Canton shops display: signs showing them to be representatives of this and the other company, and based on the size and number of these boards a tax will have to be paid annually.
One company was striving hard to get commissioned as the holders of the privilege of collecting a tax on hair-cuts, But that, for one, lias fallen through. It did not seem feasible to the government.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.