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Hokitika Guardian, 15 September 1931, Page 4

As, everybody realises by this time, the split in the 1 Labour Party haw arisen over' differenes of opinion about the dole. The “Review of Reviews” for May last- referred to this system in rather scathing terms. “Beginning as a legitimate and worthy measure to ensure tne maintenance of workers temporarily , displaced trom their it lias developed into 'a huige national charity committed to the support of over a million and a half of people at an annual cost to the State of £45,030,000.” The burden of this expenditure is, of course, intolerable, but. as M. Siegfried, one of the acutest of our Continental critics, has pointed out, the gravest feature, of the condition is not so much the-, intensity of unemployment in Britain ,as its permanence. As Siegfried has said elsewhere, the danger is that the British people may resign themselves to let the dole frankly be l come “State assistance without contributions from the beneficiaries,” ' and recent .) events seem tending ifi ;tlia t t direction. But in spite of the enormous expense and the palpable dangers that the system, entails, it was, Siegfried’s opinion, formed after careful observation six months agp- ; that “no politician would dare to attack openly the > policy of the dole; he would simply lose Ills seat.” The truth of this estimate of the situation that the dole might bo reduced. Mr Thomas has courageously defended himself against the heinous charge of advocating a 10 per cent, cut in unemployment pfiy, and he has warned the workers that the 10 per cent. . cut to-day may save 50 per cent, later on. But they decline to believe him, and follow Mr Henderson with “alarums and excursions, drums and trumpets.” : " ,i.