STATE DEPENDENTS

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 2004, 11 March 1914, Page 7

STATE DEPENDENTS

■WARNING FROM EARL GREY. The danger' of too great dependence, on tho State, which ho saw at least in an incipient form in New Zealand, was condemned by Earl Grey in a speech delivered yesterday at a lunchcon tendered to iiini by the New Zealand Club and tho Wellington branch of the Royar Colonial Institute. Earl Grey had been saying a great many things laudatory of New Zealand and its people, but the concluding sentences or his speech (which follow) were in the nature of a warning. "Having, I hope, proved to you that I have a great aftection for Now Zealand, and a great belief in its future," ho said, "may 1 go on to say ono word of possible warning. There is ono fact in your national life which I havo only just discovered, and it has caused mo to experience a positivo shiver of apprehension, and it is that one-eighth of your population are directly dependent upon the State. In Ireland one-twelfth of the population is directly dependent on the State, and we in the tnited Kingdom consider that to be a very dangerous proportion. May I with the greatest respect say that I do not believe it is possib'o for any nation which encourages its people to lio down upon the Stato to win either greatness or prosperity. (Applause.) I hope you have not got to that stato in New Zealand, hut you are in a dangerous position, or you may bo sooirif.you do not take-care. Wherever you find tho people lying dotvn on the State you will iind an all-pervading influence which is seriously detrimental to the national character; you will find a poison which saps tho energ} , , impairs the efficiency, and impoverishes and pauporises and degrades tho character of tho people. Take care, I would add, that you do not make the dependents of the State the masters of the. Stato. High wages, I admit, may bo stimulated for a time by borrowed money, but there is only one source, and one source only, fronvjvhich can bo permanently derived tho greatness and prosperity of the State,'and that is the high average output of the individual workers, and the wealth developed by the primary producers." (Applause.)