FREETRADE IN ENGLAND.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume V, Issue 1445, 15 January 1887, Page 3

FREETRADE IN ENGLAND.

The Ttmuha Leader publishes the fol lowing letter, reoelved by Mr W. G. Jutland, of that town, from his brother, Mr James Rutland, last mail from England : — " I suppose you do not have any •• Primrose " meetings out there We have them m almost every village ; we are all getting very Conservative ; we see now to onr coat the. fallacy of a one-Bide freetrade ; we are swamped with foreign goods, also workmen, more especially Germans. Our own people are wandering about with nothing to do. Some t<f our shops have nothing but foreign goods to cell . It i% all very well to have cheap goods for the well-to-do class, but is very different for the work* Ing clasE63. When they have no work they have no money, and a cheap article Is of no avail to them if they have no money to purchase it. What they want is employment, and how are they to find it if all manufactured goods are to be imported 1 If we could send pur goods into the foreign markets as free as we receive j them here we could &t»nd our own ground. Our farmers are nearly all ruined \ rents ore down 30 per cent, consequently the price of land is proportionately down. When the farmer cannot pay his rent we Buffer all round. Agricultural laborers are now tairing 83 and 10 1 per week, man and wife 13a. Then the landlord oannot make any improvements either on his own home or on his farms, consequently trades of all binds Bufjfer. The million" <-f Vrnrd e&Bh we Bend oqt of the 0011 n try instead of our own manufactured articles la enormous which gives employment to foreign workpeople, whereas if it was spent at home our people would find employment and bo satisfied. Wo have OharHy Organisations m nearly every' town, wh'ch are detested by the industrious working man, who only wants work, and not to be fed as a pauper. Why should England be tfce cas3paw for the who^e' world because a few well-inten-tioned men, such os Oobden, Bright, and Yilliers, and a few othera, some 40 years ago, propounded the scheme of Freetrade, which appeared to answer very Vfell for about 1Q yeavs, but (for the lost 30 years has been the greatest curse to ub that could have happened ? We have loßt our position m the markets of the world, and have been the means of improving almost every manufactured artfole, and wby ? Because In foreign countries labor is cheaper, artizins live for much less than onrs do, and the demand for their products m the present markets of the world is such that even with the aid of raaohiaery wa haye no chanoe at all, We oannot send our gooda into any market now as cheap aa they can make them themselves, therefore I say that Freetrade is a ourse to the British working man." The Leader adda that the writer of the above, who his been an architect, contraotor, and large employer of labor for 40 years, is m a good position to form an opinion on the subject he discusses, He is also, and has been for the last 15 ye>ars, Seoretary to tfya South of Eqg'and Antiquarian and Arobsaologloal Society, and m that position has travelled the whole country. His viewi, therefore, oinnot be said to be influenced by the condition of trade m his own locality,