ENGLAND’S BURDEN

Hokitika Guardian, 9 March 1920, Page 4

ENGLAND’S BURDEN

(Mercantile Gazette)

Never in the long course of her island history, has England been confronted with such problems as those which face her to-day.

Devastated by the supreme effort she has- made to preserve her national existence from destruction, she has to repair the ravages effected by the war, to devise some means of liquidating the burden of debt which she is now forced to carry, to cope as best'she may with the animosity of her late enemies, but also to prevent danger from within her own borders. At the termination of the Napoleonic Wars, her people rallied around her and her only task was to follow along these lines which led to recuperation. She did this without effort, as she had no other matter to think of, her Allies were able to take care of themselves, no great political questions such as are incidental to the ■ complete passing away of an old historic | empire and its division into several nations, each starting with an undisguised sentiment of hostility to c;ie another. There was no appalling prospect of starvation overtaking millions of people aS there is to-day, and above all, the population of the British islands set themselves to face hard work, well knowing that upon their efforts depended the well being and safety of the nation. To-day everything is different. England never stood in a prouder position from a military or naval view-point. The war demonstrated that the old fightincr spirit had not diminished, that the men of 1914-1920 were not inferior to the boys who fought at Albuera, who held the lines at Torres Veras and defeated tlie French Guards at Waterloo. The men of to-day, whether they come from the factories, and offices of England, from the sun-kissed lands of the East, or from the prairies of Australia and Canada, fought with the same tenacity, with equal bravery as did their sires of one hundred and twenty years back. But the problems, which England has tb solve to-dav are different in their nature, and will tax her strength to the utmost. It is because she has successfully established the fact that she is the greatest power in Europe, perhaps in the world to-day, that has increased her difficulties. The starving and bankrupt nations of Europe look to her for salvation, politically and economically, and the burden crushing as it is, she must carry apparently alone and at a time, when from internal domestic causes she is at least able to bear it. In 1.815 England’s working people went from war to their fields, mines, and manufactories, full of the desire to work and determined to restore the country as quickly as possible to pre-war prosperity. There was no clamour then for shorter hours, nor was there any supposition that the world could be made into a free restaurant in which men could eat, drink and make merry without work. To-day it is deemed possible, that by refusing to work, except under such conditions that the employer cannot sell his goods to foreign countries, an earthly paradise can be created. This cannot be, and the sooner the fact is realised that a workmen can only receive for liis labour something less than the employer receives for that which

the workman produces the better. •Everyone knows now that the foreign changes "are important factors in tlie cost of living; purchases from other countries can and must be paid by exchange o‘f goods if the price is to he kept within reasonable limits, and it is one of the burdens which England is hearing to-day that she has to pay nearly six shillings for every dollar’s worth of goods she imports from America, and that the European countries cannot buy much from her on account of the fall of their currency against sterling,

and there is no way by which these adverse factors, interfering as they do with the international trade, can be ameliorated except by production, and for so long as the labour soviets adopt their present policy of looking for relief by increasing wages instead of producing, there is but little hope of the world becoming more prosperous, or the people enjoying great happiness. There was a time, not very long ago, when England believed that she alone ' would not have to take upon herself tile full burden, that another great nation would willingly and sympathetically come to her assistance and hear with her the cost, and accept the gratitude of those poorer nations who through her would be led to prosperity, but there seems no hope of that at present. England, not for the. first time in her long and glorious past, must herself be the one to whom those who are in need must long for assistance, knowing well that she will do -her best to give them what they need.