Citizens Say

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 38, 7 May 1927, Page 10

Citizens Say

To the Editor,

AN ARCH IN QUEEN STREET Sir,— The new lii 1 worth Building, on the old Thames Hotel site, has delighted me and many others. To-day 1 learn that a sister building is eventually to be erected on the present Waitemata 11oto! site. 1 suggest that provision be made for the two to be joined by an arch—a memorial arch, a triumphal arch, an arch of welcome, any sort of arch, in fact, so long as it is a “dream of beauty.” Possibly this would be unique in the Southern Hemisphere. BAALBEC. NEW ZEALAND AND ROYAL NAVY Sir, No one will deny, least of all myself, the excellent work done by Royal Naval Reserve officers during the war, as navigators in some of the bigger ships and in command of various types of auxiliary craft, which did such invaluable work against U-boats. At the same time, as a member of the permanent naval forces, both during the war and after, I cannot quite see how “Ex-R.N.R. (Tempy)” proposes to man our warships at very short notice with officers up to the rank of lieut.-commander, from the Merchant Service.

Where would he get his gunnery and torpedo experts to begin with —essential officers both, particularly the former, who controls all the guns of the ship in action—men who must have years of special training to qualify them for their jobs? “Ex-R.N.R.” says that he lias had no actual service in the “silent and efficient Navy” in peace time (all the more power to him that his service was all during the war), so how can he set himself up as a critic of what is or is not done in the ships, nowadays ? Reading between the lines of his letter published in THE SUN last night, I presume that “Ex-R.N.R.” is a navigator. With his length of service in ships of the Royal Navy, he should be fully aware that there are half-a-dozen or more other highly-specialised branches of the service to take into consideration. Also, each cruiser requires from twenty to thirty officers in all departments. Assuming that merchant service men could fill all the jobs but the two I mentioned above, what would happen to our merchant fleet by the time only the two cruisers were manned? “B.C.S ” PARNELL BUS SERVICE Sir, As a resident of the district affected, I wish to endorse your excellent article in Wednesday’s issue regarding the effect of the increase in bus fares in the Parnell section. Before the recent increase in bus fares the 8.45 a.m. bus to town was always filled to overflowing. Often it was impossible to get into the bus at all. But this morning the sum total of all the Parnell residents desiring to us“e this bus two. The answer is obvious. We were once promised that if the bus regulations were carried we should continue to have a bus service as good, if not better, than before. The value of such a promise can be seen from the fact that we now have a service about one-third as good, for which we are expected to pay nearly 50 per cent, more! Is it any wonder, therefore, that the Parnell residents are dissatisfied with the disgraceful treatment

meted out to them, and prefer to walk to town rather than patronise buses so extortionately and ridiculously run? We are convinced that a service of buses of an economical type, running to a regular time-table, instead of a spasmodic arrangement that no one can remember, ought to be able to pay its way on the old fares; and, moreover, that the council service has recently been doing so. Mr. Ford, or anyone else, is unable to prove the contrary, because of the fact that a very great percentage of the users of this bus service has travelled on tramway concession cards. How long do we have to put up with such puerile attempts to prove that buses cannot compete with trams when, with our own eyes, we have seen private companies do it, and do it successfully? One thing further we would like to know: What benefits have the people of Auckland derived from sending Mr. Ford abroad? It seems that the only results, as distinct from benefits, have been: (1) The raising of fares —which a child could have predicted anyway; (2) A proposed Point Chevalier addition to our existing white elephant—and this in spite of the scrapping of trams over the length and breadth of England and America and the growing use of buses abroad. (3) The privilege of giving a few tramway officials bonuses for their extra services (?) to the public; (4) An attempt to convince us that buses cannot compete with trams. We regret having to say so, but it seems almost as reasonable to ask Mr. Ford about the use of buses abroad as it is to pick up our ideas of vegetarianism from the family butcher. —“WALKER.” May 6.

LABOUR’S POLICY Sir, Labour wants to endow motherhood, and being very generous (with consolidated funds) is prepared to do so up to 10s per child. A Reformer said that this meant that “some people would have to keep other people’s children, a criticism -which aroused much scorn in Labour ranks. Still the facts are with the critic.. If we imagine a State consisting of 100,000 people, 50,000 having children and 50.000 having none, is it not clear that if the mothers an? endowed out of a fund contributed to by all, that the childless would be helping to “keep other people’s children?*’

Another Labour discovery is “cheap money,” though I believe I have heard of it before. This is supposed to be a remedy for our land troubles, but although it would be a very fine thing for people with high-rate mortgages which they could convert into lowrate mortgages, there is nothing fundamental in the scheme. Eventually all the advantages of cheap money vv ould be capitalised by land owners who would add them to the price of their land.

Labour used to have what it called a usehold “land” policy. Inter alia it was designed to prevent a man selling the work of his own hands (say a house or a crop) in the open market. That would have been the State-theft of individual earnings. Thev did not get away with this.” What they have done is to “do away with it," and in evli thes l - haVe sub stituted a LibS land Policy. If “Liberalism” is antWrvivL. 6 at least (being repentwhinh t o resuscitate “Liberalism," which is the one thing most lacking J™ t £ e ir Pdicies- They have gone back to Ballanee and Seddon, but without acknowledging their obligation, They

should have gone back another be 20 years to Henry George- ceP t policy in force, “workers” (9® F of the community) would motherhood endowments, . courts, trades unions, minimum , rates, etc., all of which wouib reached the dodo stage. * 3al I V l ~L o ii|t' Seddon did well, but not well They should not have included emptions in their land P° lc fjgf' any graduation. If land tion is sound, it is just as so if plied to land from £0 to s'i value as above that figure, 1 fcf is equitable it cannot tween large and small owners- * Cjfj is nothing fundamentally. " ■ SpV large holdings. It is quite nay, it is probable, that n r Ip could run large farms employ eoC'Bp' labour, and make more for ' n ■ cerned than they could earn &. W.; holdings. The moral is, K ee * damental principles and ap s‘ ■ thoroughly without fear or K