"FOOLISH RESTRICTIONS”

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 987, 2 June 1930, Page 13

"FOOLISH RESTRICTIONS”

TOO MUCH FORMALITY LEADS TO ISOLATION FRENCH VISITOR PROTESTS A French, visitor. Mr. J. I'. Powell j FTichs, protests strongly against what I he calls the "foolish restrictions* 5 im- | posed by the Government on foreigners entering New Zealand. The more formality you have, the i more isolated you will be,' 5 he says. ! Mr. Fuchs is touring New Zealand j in the interests of a large group of j French, manufacturers, and speaks I with, enthusiasm of the way in which * the French industries, such as the [ clothing and wine and spirit busi- i nesses, are booming. He considers that the £lO tax do- j manded by the Government of all | foreigners entering New Zealand is j childish. In France the entry tax is 10s for first class passengers, and , smaller amounts for others. "On my arrival in Auckland there ; was first” the question of passports on j the boat. 5 ’ he said, “and then there was trouble with the Customs officials in regard to my samples. Following a medical examination, I had totake the form of oath subscribing to the laws of the country. 1 consider that ridiculous, as it is only common sense that any foreigner knows that he has to obey the laws of the country where lie may be.'* Speaking of the £lO tax, he said it j was refunded later if no business were done, but it was most troublesome for wealthy tourists and business men to have to be bothered with the tax, and in many cases buyers and travellers had to pay the money out of their own pockets owing to the difficulty of collecting such odd sums from their head | offices. He considered that it would be bet- j ter to have a fixed tax calculated on j the length of time spent in the Domin- ! ion. Generally the average business man from overseas had very little time to. spare, and lie could not afford to be bothered with trivial matters. "The simplest method will be the best,” he said. "It will be the cause of bringing more competition from abroad, lowering the price of goods, and bettering the quality.” As compared with France, he thought that New Zealand’s soil was barely scratched. He attributed much of the prosperity in France to the fact that the people did not remain in and about the cities as was the case in New Zealand and Australia. Out of a population of 40,000,000. there were 4,000,000 in the capital ( Paris), 1,000,000 in Marseilles, and the remainder of the population was evenly distributed over the country. Every scrap of earth was under cultivation.