THE TARIFF QUESTION.

Southland Times, Volume I, Issue 47, 21 April 1863, Page 5 (Supplement)

THE TARIFF QUESTION.

(From the Daily Age.) Tariff questions must necessarily occupy a large share of the attention of the Intercolonial Delegates. These touch the respective colonies in a place where, as lawful descendants of British parentage, they are proverbially sensitive. Whilst willing to make concessions that may be of service to our neighbors, we protest against such bein*? given "without a very distinct equivalent, presently appreciable. Tn the preliminary stage of consideration, it must be carefully borne in mind that Victoria holds a posilion widely different from that occupied by the other three colonies represented at the Intercolonial Conference. The consuming 'power is ours, that of production and export is, at present, more peculiarly theirs. We take from New South Wales, South Australia, and Tasmania, their productions, and we send them gold in exchange. With natural capability of production equal to that of any of our neighbors, we must be careful not to adopt such a course as would make our present temporary relative position a normal one. That we do not produce up to the standard of our requirements in many important departments is due to the accident of gold discovery — to the absorbing character of the new pursuit thus brought into prominence — and the shortcomings of our land legislation in past years as well as now. With decreasing- exports of the precious metal, it is necessary for us to guard jealously the nascent arts of production just beginning to swell into development. We do not want mutual free trade in wine and tobacco with South Australia and New South Wales. Tobacco planting and wine making are in a promising infancy with us. This year, for the first time, we have a fair breadth of land under tobacco crop, and the vineyards begin to assume the character of an important vested interest. Those who have undertaken these enterprises have done so in the face of labor much dearer than in the neighboring colonies. The superiority of our gold-fields now maintains, and is likely to continue to keep the price of labor over the rate at which it is obtainable iu the territory of our neighbors. It would, therefore, be manifestly unjust, and to the last degree impolitic, to bring into equal competition the produce of foreign cultivators grown up under more favorable conditions than our own producer can compass. It is not our purpose to revive the dogmas of protection or free trade, believing as we do that those are — in practice — by no means so far apart as their respective supporters delude themselves into believing. Free trade we always find accompanied with the saving clause of being put aside when financial necessity demands revenue. Without being insensible to its many advantages, we can no more digest free trade, pure and simple in every department of commerce, than we can accept unconditionally the formula of the protectionist. As in England, each staple of import and export must be judged upon its individual merits, and bearing in mind collateral circumstances, we are not, like England, in a position to resort to direct taxation. We have no income-tax to use as an adjusting 1 equivalent when other sources of revenue diminish or increase. Direct taxation in a new country, before landed and other interests become consolidated, would be a bugbear to drive away capital, and to check immigration. The abandonment of any tax upon luxuries, even in favor of our beloved cousins of New South Walts and South Australia, is erroneous in principle and, in degree, dangerous in practice. The abolition of duties on New South Wales and South Australian wines would thus be double-edged in its injurious effect. Not only must it put the local grower in an inferior position, owing to the higher price other unavoidable ciri cumstances compel him to pay for labor, ' but it diminishes the revenue, and thereby necessitates the imposition of some fresh burden upon the people. Beyond the reasonable courtesies due to our neighbors, as derived from a common stock, located in contiguous positions, and with similar progressive instincts, we owe them no special gratitude to be paid in substantive concessions which might result in our own individual and national detriment. We confess we are at a loss lo perceive what equivalent Now South Wales and South Australia can offer us for the admission of their wines duty free. Their putting Victorian wines upon a similar footing is, at any rate at present, no compensation. We emphatically repeat that Victoria is the consuming- market, and should not throw away the advantage that such must be to a growing local interest. When Mr. Cobden negotiated the last tariff compact with Fiance, he did not accept, as an equivalent for the sacrificed duties on Frt-nch wines, that British brandy should be admitted upon favorable terms to the notice of the French consumers. He demanded and obtained in exchange substantial compensation in the shape of diminution or abolition of French duties upon coal and those articles which England produced largely, and whose consumption in France would benefit existing interests in Great Britain. What ran possibly be suggested that New South Wales or South Australia will take from us except our gold, for which every country in the world is a ■willing competitor, with ports already free \ What leading staple is there that our astute sisters will take, or we can offer, in exchange for their vin tapes, which will benefit the capitalist and laboring class in Victoria, as our free admission of their wine produce will with similar classes in their possessions \ In the export of their wines our neighbors must remember ihat they already possess a special advantage as against other wine producing countries in their contiguity to the consuming market. The lessened cost of freight, and interest of money saved are differential advantages largely in their favor. It will be too much to ask that their old-established vineyards should be brought into direct and hostile competition with a local interest, which is just struggling into existence against manifold difficulties. In the use of local grown wiues over imported there must always be the advantage of a better check upon the genuineness of the article sold. When the producer and consumer meet in the same market, the first will be bound to sell a good article, or meet speedy retribution in the shape of loss of demand. With goods from a distance, there is greater risk of adulteration and trickery. We may have tailings from a particular vineyard — more wine than it could possibly produce — palmed off with much less risk of detection lhan if the source of supply were amongst ourselves. We have noV

doubt our views may be nnpalaleable to dealers in colonial wine, who might possibly seen re larger profi Is, if South Australian and New South Wales wines were admilted duty free. We believe, however, that it will be better for the producing interest of the colony, aad ultimately for the consumers, that we should permit ouv own growers to retain the tariff advantages which they contemplated when they expended capital in so spirited a form of enterprise. Whilst fully appreciating the progressive efforts of our neighbors, and noticing with pleasure their material success, we must be careful to follow their example in this respect, and, even at the risk of a reputation less chivalrous, do what lies in our power to stimulate and foster local production. The prize lies at our feet. We have the option of taking it up or spurning it"across the border