VERGING ON CHAOS

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1000, 17 June 1930, Page 9

VERGING ON CHAOS

GERMANY’S PROFLIGACY THREATENS RUIN CRITICISM BY EXPERT BERLIN, Sunday. Drastic criticism of German finance is the keynote of the final report of Mr. S. Parker Gilbert, Agent-General for Reparation Payments. Mr. Gilbert denounces the profligate expenditure of public bodies, from the Government of the Reich to rural communes, as the most serious danger threatening the country. Otherwise all promises well, he says. Rationalisation IS.s largely increased production, the standard of life has risen and a permanent credit balance has been established in foreign trade.

“But the future cannot be faced,” says Mr. Gilbert, “unless the public finances are extricated from the chaos into which they have been plunged by years of spendthrift methods. So far there has been no effective recognition of the principle that, the Government must live within its income. “Current expenditure on the army and the navy has risen to 700,000,000 marks, not including pensions, compared with 459,000,000 marks in 1924.” Mr. Gilbert’s report coincides with the issue by the German Government of a scheme of economies. This is accompanied by a threat that clause 48 of the Constitution will be resorted to unless the Reichstag passes the economies clause to allow the President to act in a national emergency.