A TARIFF SUGGESTION

Hokitika Guardian, 20 June 1930, Page 5

A TARIFF SUGGESTION

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Comment on the tarili position was made by Mr W. J. Poison, M.P., president, nt the New Zealand Farmers’ Union Conference in Wellington on Tuesday.

‘•There has been a considerable agiatation of late lor the establishment of a Tariff Board,” said Mr Poison. “The use of the term ‘Tariff Board’ creates a wrong idea. As a piece ol machinery such a body would be undesirable It would think in terms ol tariffs. It would have skilled advocates before ’it advocating particular interests and there would he only the banners Union to repesent the general interests of the community. This body could hardly be expected to have a tariff advocate continuously briefed 111 every application to the Tariff Board. But frankly I see no other organisation to which we can turn for the protection of the public in these matters. The general public interest is not considered at all in the Arbitration Court, for instance, yet it is the general public which pays every wage increase. The position before a purely machinery Tariff Board would, .to my mind, be worse than Before the Arbitrntin Court, A Tariff Bond purely is not acceptable. A BOUNTY BOARD.

“The greatest objection to a protectionist tariff is- that it never stops, l't is imposed in the first instance to let infant industries grow up. But no .protected industry will admit having grown up. They all claim to be Peter Pan industries and. Oliver Twist like, they are always asking for more protection. Therefore the efficient industries got vvliat' they don t need and the inefficient industries get what they don’t deseve. How then shall we dii'ferentiate between the deserving and the undeserving industries? To that I answer by making each industij prove: — (1) That it is economically sound. (2) That the assistance it asks for is merited.

(3) That it can come to healthy selfsuporting condition within a numbei of years.

“It does not matter to the industry concerned how it gets its help, but it does matter to the taxpayer and consumer. A tariff increase hears a loading of the wholesalers’ and retailers’ profit, and this may he anything from twenty to one hundred per cent. The (•ost of collecting the tariff tax from the consumer is high, it is never easy to atssess and its effects are hard to discover.

“A bounty payment to an industry however, is a definite cost to the community, it costs the consumer no more than the payment by the Treasury and its effects can be seen. Further, a bounty can be granted for a period to decline each year until it disappears. [ would rename the necessary tribunal a ‘Bounty Board.’

“A Bounty Board thinks in terms of giving money snvay. It has to justify each grant, and the extent of it. A Bounty Board is not likely to throw good money into had industry, and if ah industry continues to need bounty feeding it is self-evidently a bad proposition. By the establishment ot a Bounty Board then, the efficient would no longer lie helped when they doU t need it, the inefficient would cease to be a useless drain on the public purse and the industry __with a future would be able to make good by assistance granted over a reasonable period, but coining to an end at a definite date. Meanwhile the farmer and the consumer generally would lie relieved of the costly Customs tariff.”