AN INTERVIEW

Hokitika Guardian, 14 January 1932, Page 6

AN INTERVIEW

POSITION IN SYDNEY. WELLINGTON, January 12. In an interview to-day with a representative of the “Times,” Mr J. E. Stracban, principal of the itangiora High School, was caustic in his references to the way Sydney appears to be facing economic difficulties. “I spent the bert part of a coupie of weeks in Sydney, just long enough to hear some of the noise without appreciating what it was about,” ne said, “but Sydney gave hie the impression of a very overgrown, fat man with a load on his back, tiymg to hitch himself up with his own braces and getting them tangled round his neck. They’ve got all sorts of ’wonderful schemes for economic recovery in New South Wales, but they all seemed to me to be no more than a .re-shuffling of the cards they hold rather than getting beitter'cards, in their hands. The talk is of lotteries, taxation schemes, release of bank depositors’ credits, and so on, retlnstribution of titles to what wealth there is, but there is no real attempt to increase the national income as a whole. However, I don’t know whether there may be something good behind it all. Meantime the people seem to be getting as much fun out of life as ever. They don’t take depressions so seriously as we do, and they still believe in Aurtrlaia’s future. The man I met most frequently in Sydney was Mr Micawber, still spinning the same old tale.”