AFFAIRS IN CANADA

Hokitika Guardian, 9 March 1933, Page 2

AFFAIRS IN CANADA

POWER OF THE PRAIRIE

PROBLEMSi OF -DEPRESSION. i

'VANCOUVER, February 8-

The Canadian /Prafrie is the driving .force in Dominion affairs just now. Ever since the.-stock market crash at the end of 1929, the West, led-by a growing mUi. tancy among the .agra’rian community, has been Tiamme-hing/ ©n the door-s of the Federal and Provincial Parliaments, demanding ‘ redress. Wheat is lees than half the price it i brought three years ago. Credit for: current activities is more difficult to obtain as mortgages get farther in arrear. /

• Declining Revenues an the municipal, provincial and federal/sphere have forced taxation up, and' reduced the output on public works, -whether of new construction of-bridgets/and roads, or of ma/nten. # ahce'and repair. The purch:sing price of th-e dollar concerns farmers but little as ■dollars becorme mor e scarce. School services are retrenched. yedeyal and’provincial -departments' have cut, nearly to vanishing point, services they formerly rendered in j agriculture, dairying and istock raising. The immediate outlook is for more ‘taxation, more retrenchment, fewer public’ services.

, The lack of money to meet th e current needs;of life’has led the farmers to take throe drastic tst-eps tljiat worn a have been elossfed Utopian in the brave days o-f ' ;-=t(1) Scrip money i,s alraadv ip; otvculation in Alberta, where t*h e United Formers -have urged jts gen. eral use on. the; Provincial Government. (2) The ! farmers’ conventions of the three . Prairie, Ontario allied • with the' 'Fedefal iLabour Party; by affiliating with the o°onerative- Oommonwealth Federation. (31 Farmers have supported the action of the Calgary C'tv-Council, in refusing to pay . 300,000 exchange (about £60,000 at ! par) on a . loan of 2,500.000 dollars.' (aboait £500.000 at pat), which matured in New 'York on January 1.

Scrip money, pioneered In North Amß-j-ica' >a year 1 ago, in the State of Washington.'‘and) now!used tin ,29’'States',' ha.s benn' prpnouneed ',succesi?fnl -.in. Raymond, Aliherta,; after a -six-months' trial.' Tts sponsors -say, they iare ■•merely walking in’.the ‘footsteps of; pioneers who opened up the ;prn'iri 0 with barter, the oldoßtkndw.n; marketing \mhth"d. The Raymond (delegate,' whose report swung thb Unit-pd' i'Farmer.s of ; Alberta'/ h;tp’ line, ~v.arplled; t'h'e ; scrip used v bv. Brinbam Young', ’ "who-ded a colony l of settlers acroKs; the line from Utah/to new pastures ‘tin* 4 the foothill s of/the Rockies. A, forge ~sum./t-liat 'would/ hav.p' gone; to banksP in /interest ,-had, the said, b e e,n saved.) Barter has - been; an increasing incentive to carrying/- on ' routine coiiq-muriity-eervices;since .money grew Scarce, •Surplus\ wheat, held -against a rise " in price, exercises many of the functions of curi'ency.' Th e plu.mber cures his tooth. ache, by- plugging i the':leak) in,- the den-tist-V; bath,

• Til® Central Bank k the 1 goal 1 aimed at by the fanners-of "Western Canada in affilintincc wjtlvths : Co-opera tiv® Common, wealth Federation, whosepolicy is. mere, ly a modern; •m'tevpret.a'bqn of the s°ciaiist,;4octrine of nationalising the means of [production, distribution and exchange. By' joining it, the farmers have “gone iLabcuf” ' only to th.a extent oi securing credit by means 0 f foanking reform. In .its refusal : to pay... exchange of American loans,- th e Calgary City' Coun. cil isf taking a step, that scores of Canadian cities - would take if .they thougnt there 1 was a reasonable prospect of success.- The loan was floated in 1913, when exchange at its { present calamitous rate was not dreamed of. The. legal aspect notwithstanding, the vast majority Canadians are sympathising with Calgary’s .dilemma. It has brought to light Rome'astonishing facts. . Nearly half of the aggregate Canadian bonded indebtedness is redeemable in th e United States. Canada’s debt obligations to •her. neighbour involve payment of a million dollar® (about £200,000 at par) a day. With these three issues in the van, buttressed by the demand lor unemployment insurance, the West’ fs tho, proving ground for to-day’s major problems in Canada. .