The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND WEDNESDAY, APRIL 23, 1930 ROBBING THE RICH

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 954, 23 April 1930, Page 10

The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND WEDNESDAY, APRIL 23, 1930 ROBBI NG THE RICH

A SPLIT in the British Labour Party is threatened because of the alleged failure of the MacDonald Government to rob the rich more effectively for the benefit of the poor. The conference of the Independent Labour Party, now in session at Birmingham, has passed a resolution with that meaning, although its phraseology softens the robbery to “drastic taxation of the wealthy for the money required for social services.” In terms that must have seemed ironical to Mr. Philip Snowden, the conference deplored the Government’s failure to make adequate provision in the Budget for the process of political brigandage. This year the Labour Chancellor of the Exchequer has budgeted for a revenue of over £700,000,000 from all sources of taxation, the prospective sum being £40,000,000 more than the aggregate of taxes demanded by Mr. Winston Churchill who, when in Mr. Snowden’s place, was denounced as an ingenious and a notorious bandit. Most of such taxation has been and still will be imposed on the wealthy. No country in the world is more severe on its rich citizens than Great Britain lias been since the war, and no other nation is more considerate to its moderate income-earners. New Zealand is supposed by wily politicians to be the best-favoured country in that respect, but the claim is merely supposition. Wliat the worker does not pay in incometax, he pays in Customs dues.

Only one person in every twelve in Great Britain pays income-tax. This is all the more remarkable if and when consideration has been given to the fact that the effective exemption limit in the United Kingdom is £135, as compared with £3OO in (his tax-ridden country. Last year 4,950,000 British Islanders had incomes above the low exemption limit. But only 2,200,000 were charged with tax, the remainder securing relief. It has been pointed out authoritatively that the total incomes of the '•.950,000 persons reached the colossal sum of £3,020,519,000. Vet the total on which income-tax was actually charged amounted ro £1,301,054,000, which yielded £227,022,000 to the Treasury. Therefore it is clear that if the wealthy have been spared, the Chancellor of the Exchequer also was merciful to the small man. But in addition to paying income-tax on the heaviest scale in the world those with great riches had to pay £60,000,000 in supertax, and £72,000,000 in estate, legacy and succession duties. Of course, the working man had to provide a substantial share of the £139,000,000 in taxation on beer and alcoholic liquors, but that was not compulsory inasmuch as the way to evade payment was simply to stop consuming the taxed beverages. From the viewpoint of the Independent Labour Party, whose vision is anything but clear, the rich must be robbed more drastically in order to provide money for the upkeep and extension of social services. Something might be said in favour of the insatiable party’s demand if the method and heavy expenditure on social relief really helped to eliminate unemployment and widespread distress. So far, the position has become worse instead of better, and the best that has been done to ease the lamentable situation is the extension of unemployment insurance, involving an additional expenditure of £16,000,000 this year. Sixty thousand juveniles have become entitled to increased benefits, while the old clause as to “not genuinely seeking work” has been eliminated, thus making an additional 200,000 persons eligible for the dole. •

Under the Conservative and Labour v Governments during the past seven years no less than £190,000,000 has been.spent on unemployment relief works. Beyond doubt that expenditure has, in Mr. Snowden’s words, “saved Great Britain from revolution,” but it has not saved it from the curse of compulsory idleness. And the record of unemployment is no better under the present Labour Government. Indeed, it grows worse. When the MacDonald Ministry assumed office for the second time ten months ago, the unemployment figures were 1,100,000 in all. Today, the total is over a million and a-half, with the prospect of the two-million mark being reached next winter. The plain truth of the matter is simply that neither Labour, nor any other party Government can solve the problem of unemployment by political magic. And the New Zealand taxpayer should note that a system of doles is the worst possible attempt at solving the problem.

LAW SOCIETY'S CONFERENCE

ONE aspect of appeals to the Privy Council which Sir Michael Myers may have overlooked is the enormous costs such appeals impose on New Zealand litigants. Many an estate has been ruined by some division of opinion which necessitated recourse to these costly legal processes. Even the Privy Council lias erred at times, and there are judgments on record which show it to have failed completely in its effort to grasp the underlyingprinciples of the action at issue. Admittedly such instances are extremely rare. Usually the Privy Council’s judgments are models of clarity and insight. Nevertheless, there is a growing feeling in Australia, if not in New Zealand, that the heavy financial burdens which such appeals involve might well be dispensed with, and it is perhaps significant that a journal so representative of legal opinion as the Sydney “Bulletin” has lent its support to this movement. The question of appeals to the Privy Council is merely one of several very interesting subjects that have already been raised at the annual conference of the New Zealand Law Society, now meeting in Auckland. In affording members of the profession an opportunity of discussing such questions, the conference proves itself an institution of much practical value. In addressing the conference yesterday, Sir Michael Myers admitted that when the annual gatherings were initiated he had doubted their wisdom, but was now fully convinced of their worth. One question which is obviously of deep concern to the profession is the arrangement by which solicitors may qualify as barristers by what is aptly termed “the side door.” This topic will interest the general public as much as anything to be discussed at the conference, as, while there are circumstances in which practical experience for five years is of greater value than academic study, it is better, as a general principle, that barristers should be fully qualified by examination. If they do nothing else, examinations tend to eliminate the unfit, and in a day when there is a distinct danger that the law may become an overcrowded profession, anything that serves this purpose is to be encouraged. Since the war the law as a profession lias attracted hundreds of youths every year. The increasing popularity of secondary education has heightened the tendency, with the result that every branch of the profession is likely to be crowded enough, without exposing it to greater congestion by eliminating any barriers. Members of the profession ure to be commended for their effort to maintain its high standards. Last year the Law Society initiated a notable piece of legislation designed to protect the clients of dishonest practitioners, and its protest against the “side door” qualification for barristers reflects the same commendable desire to maintain the high standards of the profession.