DISASTROUS YEAR

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIV, 2 January 1931, Page 5

DISASTROUS YEAR

DECREPIT AND DISCREDITED LEADING NEWSPAPER OPINION

(United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright) (Received 2nd January, 11.42 a.m.) LONDON, Ist January. Newspaper comments correctly reflect the opinion in the country that 1930 was a disastrous year. It is hoped that i 931 will be better, -but the prospect is not too bright. The “Daily Telegraph” describes the Old Year as decrepit and discredited, and the worst in modern times. It says a bad year has been made immeasurably worse through the Government being in incapable hands. No Government was ever so utterly discredited. Mr MacDonald, in an interview in the “Daily Herald,” said it had been a hard year with never such a tragic demonstration of the truth of the socialist case that machinery and capitalism were bound to break down. A few financiers in New York, London, and Paris who were using for their own ends their fortunes, were able to destroy the fruits of good harvests productive of the accomplishments of human energy, with the result that prices fall. A sense of insecurity spreads over the world and descends steadily to the darkest oppression. Fortunately there are signs that the country has reached bottom and that an upward move is beginning. The “Morning Post” says that there are two main causes for the depression, Socialism, which means wages without work, and Communism, meaning work without wages. World conditions are to Mr MacDonald what predestination was to his Calvinist forefathers, namely a sufficient substitute for good works.