MARCH TO SOCIALISM

Hokitika Guardian, 30 June 1932, Page 8

MARCH TO SOCIALISM

MR CAMPBELL'S WARNING. STATE IN, INDUSTRY. HASTINGS, June 28. ' A blunt and frank denunciation of the' Government's “'socialistic” legislation,” and cf the political and economic evils arising l’rpm rivalry among political parties in attempting to outbid one another in soliciting popular support, was uttered by Mr 11. Al. Campbell, M.L’. } tor liawice’s Ray, in an address to the Hastings Rotary Club at its weekly luncheon. Mr .Campbell assailed the Government in its role as a competitor with private business, and criticised in particular the State Advances Office, the Public' i rust Office, and the Public Works Department, and also the Government’s activities under the Transport Act. Describing the system of State interference with private enterprise as wrong and unjust, Mi' Campbell said that the system had been carried to the danger point, and. the position now was extremely serious. Every year the Parliamentary partite bid as high as they dare in an attempt to win the votes of the electors. “And if- they go on bidding in the future as extravagantly as in the past, this country is going to lie run according to the principles of straight-out Socialism. We liavp - already reached very near to that condition of affaire, and the whole of the system has been costing the taxpayer enormous sums of money.” SOP TO CERTAIN CERTAIN SECTION. The effect of the socialistic legislation that had been created, Mr Campbell added, had been to provide for a certain section of the public a sop in the shape of a reduction of taxation, hut that reduction had been made at the.expenee of those who survived to pay the taxes necesarv to make up the difference and to “keep the lin■tnc.ial pot boiling.” Almost every State enterprise, M' Camp 1 : 11 continued, was showing r ’c. s, and the great question was lion to find a means of checking these losess. The only imn'finable .solution v.-es that an already overburdened section of the taxp-y'ng public would have to foot the hi!!. A continuance -f such a svstem of draining the reserve rivourci'S of the individual as well os of industry could have onl; ono result, and that result would lr national disaster. Those that eouh possibly lie taxed on any pretext a I all were taxed to make up the los-ci resulting from the exemptions allowed to the rest of the public. STATE ADVANCES OFFICE.

The Year Book showed that the State Advances Office, up to the ent of March last year., had advanced a total sum of £‘24,000,000. Its income hv way of taxation on. that sum amounted to £Bsll. If the money hadjoeen advanced by private rading or lending companies, as had .rn.li the practice before the State Advances Office came into being, a far greater sum than £Bsll would have been earned, and a section of the tax.ayers would have been spared the burden imposed upon them by the necessity of keeping a Government department financially on its feet. “And I questicfli,” said Mr Campbell “whether the money obtained by way of loan from the State Advances Office i,s any cheaper than we were able to obtain from the private landing or ganisation before the existence of the State Advances Office.” “In tliis town we have one of the rottenest of all the ' rotten examples of State interference with private enterprise,” lie continued in references t o Government action in respect of local transport services, several of which have been put off the roads. ‘Nothing could he more unlair than .o put these people out of business, so as to make room for someone else. All ov«r the country the evil . effects of G' /erment interference and coinpetit.on with private enterprise are being felt.” “A DANGEROUS SYSTEM.”

The Public Works Department should he wiped almost entirely out of existence, and works now carried out l>v the department should be done by private tender and private enter■pris*. “We have drifted into a dangerous system, and I think that most of us to-day see the futility ot it,’ added Mr Campbell. “In this email country with a population of about a million and a half we have over 40 different Government departments, each with its i.vn head and an army id clerks, and each trying to boost its own work. We have reached a desperate position, and if we are not care!ill we .■hull find ourselves sharing the fate

f Rome, where every second man b-v.-naie a tax-gatherer; or in other word a Civil Servant. We are setting the right way about, crashing this country, and tin 1 crash will come il we are not careful. We are as overburdened with legal governing bodies ; 1S we are with Government departments. In this district alone we have a do/.eii governing hollies where two or three could do the whole of the necessary work. The whole system involvcvs an enormous extra cost as well as a waste of* time.

“Thu sooner this Government decides to devote itseli to the task of governing and eoa.-'i 1 ,, to dabble in business that it is not capable of conducting then the better for everybody, and the greater will he Ihe allowance of political and personal freedom to the individual,” concluded .Ur Campbell.