PRESS COMMENT.

Hokitika Guardian, 13 October 1927, Page 3

PRESS COMMENT.

In private enterprise there are too many shocks and surprises and dangers, both for employers and employees, to allow the worst habits to form, but in tho service of the State the only corrective to the bureauratic habits is effective public complaint and criticism. Indeed the proof of this is the zeal with which all public officials seek to remove themselves as far from the public as they can, in the worst eases bv a studied contempt of the public, but usually by seeking, in the magical names of efficiency and economy, to get control contrnlised in some Departmental headquarters. This is the method employed in the Department. of Education, and it must not ho supposed that we have heard the last of it because there- has been a temporary setback to the movement to abolish hoards. The Department has taken shelter in the meantime behind a promised “investigation of the whole position,” which means simply that it- will have a. holder face and front when it comes again to tho attack.—“ Christchurch Press”.

The history of the timber industry in New Zealand is one of reckless waste and extravagance. In eighty years or so, about three generations, we have used or destroyed all hut a remnant of a magnificent heritage of forest .and in spite of all tho warnings that have been given waste goes on . Unless it is checked there will be a period, before the new plantations are ready for cutting, when we shall have to depend far more largely than now upon other countries for our timber supplies. '1 lie big increase in the duty now imposed on important timbers will not only add to the already heavy cost of building, hut it will encourage the extravagance and waste which have always marked the use of our native timbers and hasten the day when there will he insufficient timber to meet our requirements.—“Taranaki Herald.”

If anticipations are realised, and the Dominion keeps a reasonable brake upon imports, the new lew months will bring a most welcome change in the economic position, and the people generally will fool the benefit. Nevertheless it. will he wise to guard against a return to that careless extravagance which brought in its train an inevitable reaction. The country’s task is to build up and consolidate its position until it can be said that it is once more in the sound and prosperous condition with which the name of New Zealand was for many years associated until it suffered, from the effects of the postwar depression that struck the whole world.—“Wanganui Herald.”

It would he better now not to attempt to open up new lands for small settlement.until reading lias overtaken the older settlements. Some of the apparent aggregation of land is entirely due to the fact that small settlers placed on the land in the past have been compelled to give up their holdings, some of which have been acquired by adjoining owners, who with a larger area have a better chance of success, while others have remained unoccupied because it is impossible to work them successfully without roads to carry produce to market and to bring fertilisers and other requirements to the land. More vigour is required in loading old settlements rather than in forming new ones.—“ Tara nak i Herald. ”

AVliile there is this immediate cause of unemployment, there are remoter causes far which the Labour Party is in its measure responsible, namely, the Arbitration Act and tbe protection tariff. Both of these are factors seriously disturbing the natural and healthy development of the country’s economic system, and they have been factors also in promoting the unduly high rate of borrowing from abroad. The present unemployment is the fever produced, in an unsound economic body by a passing trade depression, which a healthy economic body by a passing trade depression, which a healthy economic body would not have felt very severely at all. There is no patent overnight cure for unemployment, and until this is realised by all our politicians these spells of unemployment will recur Unfortunately the Labour politicians arc almost certain to lie the last to realise it, partly because their ideas are defective to begin with, and partly because their political feelings make it difficult, if not impossible to consider the question fairly—“ Christchurch Press.”

The only scheme that will satisfy a large number of farmers to-dav is one that will enable them to meet tlioir second and third mortgages entered into at inflated values. Under the rural credits scheme a farmer with sound security may obtain money on better terms than lie is now called on to pay, hut the man who lias not tlio security to offer is not likely to he any more attractive to his fellow farmers than to any other institution from which lie has endeavoured to borrow money. The scheme, however, gives the Farmers” Union practically all that it asked for, and it is for Mr Poison to demonstrate that iiis demand for agricultural hanking is not only safe, hut second.—“Dannevirko Evening News.”

AVc are proud to belong to that great Federation of Nations known as the British Empire and we can best promote its welfare by buying Empire made goods, and at the same time developing the natural resources of that particular portion of the Empire over which we rule. Wc have given the British manufacturer substantial preference over his foreign competitor, and within the last few days proposals have been made m Parliament granting an even greater preference than in the past, as the result of which British manufacturers calculate that they will benefit to the extent of millions. We welcome lie British manufacturer within our gates, but our own stability as a part of the great Empire structure demands that we in New Zealand, too, must not he content with the production of raw materials aJonc, but must still further develop our secondary industries in the pursuit of our down destiny.—“ Wanganui Herald.”

It is not. after all, vastly reassuring to be told by the Marine Department that the “total extinction” of whales in the Ross Sea, as a direct result of the operations of whalers is highly improbable. No doubt it is a sound concession on the part of the Department that, since whalers might operate without entering the territorial waters at all, the prevention of the decimation of whales in the Ross Sea depends upon international agreement. But the world’s whaling activities are largely carried on by one country, and it is not considered likely that Norway would be willing to enter into an international agreement involving the introduction of restrictions. The position is unsatisfactory from whatever point of view it is regarded. It certainly seems a pity that New Zealand | should be unable to turn to her own i advantage the rights which she p-ssess- ; es over a region that constitutes one of the most profitable whaling erou--lin the world.—“ Otago Daily Times.

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