The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET AUCKLAND WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 22, 1930 LABOUR’S TEST IN BRITAIN

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 877, 22 January 1930, Page 8

The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET AUCKLAND WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 22, 1930 LABOUR’S TEST IN BRITAIN

LIKE every other party that has won popular favour by virtue of a dazzling policy, the Labour Government in Great Britain is finding it difficult to redeem its pre-section promises. This difficulty is almost certain to become intensified and even acute with the resumption of Parliamentary work yesterday for the winter session. The greater part of the MacDonald Administration’s legislative programme has yet to be subjected to the test of rival parties whose strength, if directed either by excessive caution or impulsively affected by party caprice, is such as might menace at any time the thin security of Labour’s grip on power. It is never easy for a minority Ministry to impose its will on a formidable opposition and carry out to the satisfaction of its supporters an ambitious policy. Conditions are anything but favourable for the eager Labour team which not only wants to change many things, but must change them if it is politically to survive. After six months of Parliamentary life during which there was more talk than legislative work, the Government has committed itself to an additional expenditure of £11,000,000 a year. That sum was piled up gradually by the characteristic political habit of “adding one little amount to another amount” in spite of Mr. Philip Snowden’s demand for prudent expenditure and rigorous economy. Thus today the United Kingdom is faced with a probable deficit in the Budget and the unwelcome possibility of adding sixpence or a shilling to the Income Tax. And yet only the edge of Labour’s policy has been touched. It has not yet attempted to go into the centre of its programme of legislative measures which involve a substantial sum of new expenditure. Several unemployment relief schemes, including slum clearance and swamp drainage, to say nothing about education and many other expensive social services, await consideration amid a clamour for quick action and more administrative enterprise. Lobby gossip from Westminster shows clearly that the alert Chancellor of the Exchequer realises the seriousness of the financial position and is thinking hard about effecting “drastic and crippling reductions” in the Army Estimates. Doubtless the results of the Naval Disarmament Conference will kelp Mr. Snowden to trim his forthcoming Budget, but it seems doubtful whether he will be as firm and successful in resisting the demands of his own party for fresh expenditure as he was in resistance at The Hague a few months ago. / So far, the Labour Administration’s success has been confined almost exclusively to foreign affairs. In the past six months it has contributed notably to the great change that has been wrought in international relations-—a marked change for the better—but there does not appear to he any prospect of similar achievements in British national affairs. Still, the triumph of Mr. MacDonald at Washington, as also that of Mr. Snowden at The Hague, and, in a less spectacular way, the sound work of Mr. Henderson in securing an early evacuation of the Rhineland, must have some influence on the opposing parties in the House of Commons, helping to convince them that Labour possesses high merit and a great deal of talent for sagacious administration. In other respects, however, the Government’s record has not been conspicuous for any success other than that associated with cautious activity. It still has to prove its mettle as a constructive force in national polities. Hitherto, the Government has had to be content with the process of squeezing small instalments of its big programme through a watchful, though friendly, House. The Government’s preliminary effort at stimulating employment has been the outstanding failure, and this was due largely to the obvious fact that Mr. Thomas is not the right man in the right place as Minister of Employment. It is true that he has been allotted the hardest task, but even making full allowance for that and a great deal more, he clearly lacks knowledge of the technical intricacies of the problem of unemployment. The unfortunate Minister can do nothing more than deal in palliatives and political pills. Altogether, the Labour Government is facing an extremely difficult time. It may win through with the aid of the Liberal group, but it will require to walk warily. There are many big thorns along- its path.