AUSTRALIA’S TROUBLES

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIV, 15 January 1931, Page 5

AUSTRALIA’S TROUBLES

HIGH STANDARD C" LIVING VICTORIAN VISITOR’S VIEWS “Our troubles are principally due to the fact that our standard of living has been too high, while the prices of our main stable products—wool and wheat —have fallen so low that it does not pay to grow them,” said the Hon. R. M. Guthbertson, of Melbourne, in Auckland. Air Cuthbertson, who is one of a party of six making a holiday tour, arrived by the Niagara from Sydney yesterday. He is a director of various Victorian, companies, and was a member of the last- Nationalist Ministry in Victoria.

“There is no doubt that tilings are bad financially in Australia,” Air Cuthbertson said. “The Nationalist Party, of course, maintains that the Labour Government is not doing what is necessary at present. It is not taking sufficiently drastic steps to remedy the position. Mr Scullin and Mr Lyons and some of the wiser men in the Labour Party would do the right thing if it were not for the control of the party. In the Labour movement a man has no chance of defying the party, as he is absolutely dependent on its selection to win his seat. In the National Party, on the other hand, a man, if he were strong enough, could defy the party and still win the seat. “We have got to get hack to a stanch ard of living we can afford. We have got to reduce the cost of production and take drastic and immediate steps to bring this about, otherwise the restoration of normal prosperity will be very considerably delayed.” Air Cuthbertson said the trouble had been accentuated by the fact that /Australia bad had several consecutive bad seasons, and many of the primary producers were indebted to the banks and to the Government for money and for seed advanced to them. Then, when they did get a fair season, the prices were so low that it hardly paid to harvest the wheat, or to grow the wool. The Arbitration Court Judges had been sitting for the past two or three months discussing whether the basic wage should be reduced. “Seeing that it was fixed at a time of unusual prosperity I should have thought that any schoolboy could have answered that the same rates cannot be paid now,” said Air Cuthbertson. Mr Cuthbertson and his party have planned a 29 days’ tour of New Zealand, and intend to visit the west coast sounds. Afterwards they will go to Honolulu.