Correspondence

Feilding Star, Volume XIV, Issue 150, 8 June 1893, Page 2

Correspondence

THE GOVERNMENT and FREETRADE. TO THE EDITOR OF THE STAR. Is any Government justified in trying to keep wages up to one arbitrary standard 1 No ; the rate of wages should be governed by the purchasing power of gold. If, for example, a sovereign will purchase half us much now as it would have purchased ten years ago, then a man receiving now the same number of pounds per annum, or the same number of shillings per diem, as he got then, has manifestly had his wages raised fifty per cent. There is no gainsaying thisj and the Government or Legislature, in attempting to keep wages up 10 one standard — irrespective, o£ the value of money — are working directly against the interests of producers. They are working directly against the interests of laborers too. Capitalists will not venture their funds unless there is some prospect of making a profit — and the ordinary producer cannot long work at a loss. The effect of such action on the part of the Government will be directly to raise a cry for Protection j and if this 13 granted it means an immediate rise in the cost of living — everything we eat and everything we wear will rise correspondingly ; and, I ask, who is to benefit thereby? Not the laborer, and certainly not the farmer — who is the back-bdfte of the country. Is not it a strange thing that these Liberals of today are working in an entirely opposite direction to those (now historic) Liberals who freed the British workman ; who mode England what it is to-day 1 It is hard to tell what term to apply to some o£ our leading Legislators. They are, metaphorically, letting our fair craft drift with the current — no^they are forcing her onwards to possible destruction ! It were well for us, it were well for them, if there be not a Niagara ahead ? The best we can wish fur, is that there may be shoal water that we cannot get through. Back we can hardly go. We have a Government in power who kaow absolutely nothing of statesmanship, who view with contempt and scorn nil principles of political economy. Their principle is topander to a certain class. By granting favors they will gain rotes, and thus they expect to retain place and power. That is their creed! Heaven help the colony if such men are to rule it long. I am, etc., Freetbader.