POLITICAL CAMION.

Putaruru Press, Volume VI, Issue 255, 27 September 1928, Page 5

POLITICAL CAMION.

j COUNTRY PARTY I MEETINGS. \ In Putaruru District. T Mr. S. H. Judd, a member of the Matamata County Council, and the {official candidate of the Country Party for the Rotorua electorate, addressed meetings in the Putaruru district on Thursday and Friday. There iwere fair attendances at each meeting, the chairmen of which were as follows: Messrs. White ~..( Arapuni), ((Goebel (Puketurua), Douglas (Wao£u), Johnson (Lichfield) and West KTokoroa). Votes of confidence were not asked for, though at Arapuni and Tokoroa such, a vote was carried Unanimously. The candidate received a keen and attentive hearing at all

centres. In his addresses, Mr. Judd emphasised the fact that anyone who looked at the economic position to-day could not but admit that matters "were not right. Hundreds were out of work in the towns last year, while ■workers, on the land were far less than formerly. Further, one and alialf million acres had gone out of productive occupation in the last four years.

Sir George Eliot, ex-chairman of the Bank of New Zealand, stated that one primary producer did more for the country than five employed in secondary industries, yet he admitted that he had no remedy for the present bad economic position. The Country Party had a remedy. They recognised that the primary producers were the life-blood of the nation, and their remedies went to the root of the country’s troubles and did not merely apply grease x to smoothe things over.

.’ .gii Imperial Free Trade. The first plank was the elimination, spread over a period of ten years, of the tariff on all goods from Great Britain other than luxuries, thus working up to a state of Imperial Tree trade. This would relieve the cost of living and costs of production. A customs tariff should be for revenue purposes only. Taxation should be on income and according to ability to pay. Yet taxation by protective tariff increased for the family man with every child. Married men t were the most valuable to the State, yet they were the most heavily tdx«ed by the protective tariff. Protection unbalanced industry by attracting capital and labour from one industry to another. The elimination of protective duties was absolutely necessary for improvement in the country’s economic life, f Arbitration Court. " x ~- I The Arbitration Court based awards on a false basis. Only 10 per cent qf those who came under the court’s awards had the responsibilities (two children and a wife) on which the awards were based. This helped unnecessarily to load costs on to production. The State Advances Office had been started to assist farmers to increase production, yet figures published last week showed that of £27,500,000 in advances which were outstanding, £11,000,000 was on farm lands and £16,000,000 lent To the towns. A farmer got 75 per cent advance against his security, while a town •dweller got 95 per cent. To show how these matters affected the producer, the speaker pointed out that one ounce of gold would purchase in labour in Germany 205 hours, in France 110 hours, in Britain TO hours, in United States 50 hours, and in New Zealand only 47i hours. Cost of Money.

In regard to the cost of money, the speaker quoted Sir George Eliot as .stating that the chief reason for interest on overdraft being raised was The intense competition, Governmental and private, for deposits. This meant an increase in the overdraft rate so that the profits of banks Would not be affected. The solution of the trouble was an agricultural bank which would give competition for banking business which was at prej sent blocked by the banking ring. ' \ Agricultural banks did well in other ■countries and none had been known to fail. In Denmark farmers got money at 41 per cent, about half of what it cost New Zealand farmers, who paid 6 per cent plus 2 per cent sinking fund. Electoral Reform. To secure these reforms electoral reform was necessary to ensure that •members returned to Parliament would represent a majority vote of the electors. The party’s remedy foihis was preferential voting, whir' simply meant that an elector mnrk- ► ed, candidates in order of preference. Country Party also favoured the carrying out of the law passed some years ago for the reform of the Upper House.

Local Rates. One of the greatest hardships on farmers was the cost of local rating. The land should be largely rid of the cost of roading by the Main Highways Board taking over main roads and contributing largely to main byroads. There might be some excuse for loading this cost on land years ago when traffic was purely local, but to do so now was absurd, and cars should carry the increased burden. Railway Tariff. An amendment of the railway tariff was highly necessary with the object of abolishing differential freights’ on imported'’goods such as corrugated iron,: cement, hardwood, etc. There was no possible justification for this preference, and it unduly penalised farmers, as they had to bear this tax and not dwellers on the seaboard. Exchange Rate. Touching on the rates of exchange, the candidate stated that it was only two or three years ago since farmers were milking three cows out of every 100 for the bank as payment to them for bringing farmers’ own money out from England. The rate was reduced now, but farmers were still milking one cow for the bank. The remedy was an Imperial exchange, which simply meant an agreement with Great Britain for a mutual recognition of payment of a note issue on demand. Root Causes.

The Country Party’s policy differed from all others in that it got down to root causes. The country depended on the primary producer and every effort should be made to remove all unnecessary costs which had been loaded on the primary producer. The Country Party claimed that its platform would accomplish this and thus place the lives of all sections of the community on a sounder economic basis.

The candidate urged his hearers to consider well the platforms of all parties, I and to try and recognise which would assist in re-establishing the country’s economic life on a sound basis. He felt that of all parties, the one he represented dealt most with essentials, and he hoped electors would come to the same conclusion after due consideration.

Extracts from Speech. Electors were constantly being told they had turned the corner, but they had to remember that if they kept on turning corners they would make a complete volte face and find themselves walking in the opposite direction. That was the position the people of New Zealand were in today. They were walking backwards —retrogressing—instead of going foiward. Candidates who would come forward—over fifty had done so—and agree to support a party which had no platform were not worthy of much consideration. The Labour Party was avowedly cut for a section of the community, were high protectionists, and had a foolish land policy—the usehold. Banking profits were a public scandal, and they were made while farmers were walking off their farms. During the period of depression the banks were the only section of the business community which was making profits. The only excuse for the pig subsidy was that there were subsidies on wheat and maize which raised the cost of feeding. Artificial stimulants to trade raised the cost of production all round, and the Country Party I was opposed to all such subsidies. He had not been consulted in the matter of the subsidy, but purely on how it should be allotted.

“ The Country Party is in favour of a referendum on the Bible-in-Schools question.” “ I wouldn’t be standing here tonight if the platform of the Country Party were not a national one. A party should represent all the people, and not a section of them. You can rest assured that the platform of the Country Party is one which embraces everyone and is not for farmers alone.”