The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET. AUCKLAND WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 13, 1930 THE “BLUNDER” BUDGET

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1049, 13 August 1930, Page 10

The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET. AUCKLAND WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 13, 1930 THE “ BLUNDER ” BUDGET

IS tlie right title for the Prime Minister’s financial and fiscal proposals the “Blunder Budget”? The question is raised by the latest effort of the Government to make the'best of a bad .job: and the effect of its proposed alterations to the revised tariff dues on certain imports should provide a convincinganswer. A fortnight’s experience of the Government’s new Customs and Excise duties has sufficed to demonstrate clearly that the Hon. G. W. Forbes, as Minister of Finance and Customs, "who himself would not pretend to be a tariff expert, was anything but wisely or even expertly guided by .his departmental advisers. He has been compelled to recast some of his tariff proposals in order to pacify many active objectors and incidentally to make sure of a further increase in revenue. So, whatever else may be said about the “Blunder,” or “Black,” or “Rainbow” Budget, there can be no doubt about the fact that tlie Government intends to make other people pay for its blunders and its black-and-blue policy. It is reasonable and right, of course, to give Mr. Forbes credit for having hastened an attempt to overcome errors of judgment and fiscal adjustment. At the same time it is to be regretted that tlie Government, in setting out to alter tariff schedules, which inevitably involved a disturbance of trade and an upward distortion of the cost of living, did not look more carefully into and ail around the intricate problem instead of plunging into it to extract more revenue. There will be much diversity of opinion over and about Mr. Forbes’s drastic amendments to his original proposals. Those industrialists and producers who stand to gain some relief from the higher duties to be imposed on imports naturally will applaud the Prime Minister and assure him that in tariff alterations and impositions, as in everything else, second thoughts are best, even though they may not be very good ones. Others who must bear heavier penalties and also find difficulty in maintaining their business at a reasonable profit will feel more disposed than ever to believe that the advent of the United Ministry has not been a boon for the country. Dare anyone suggest that they will be far astray in their belief ? In the meantime the Government has realised some of its fiscal mistakes, and is determined to repair them without surrendering any money. On the contrary it means, if at all possible, to get more, particularly from wine and spirit importers and the people who take alcoholic beverages for something rather more than their stomachs’ sake. But the pitcher can go once too often to the well. The price of imported alcoholic liquor now is high enough to make it prohibitive to prudent men. High tariffs may in time promote a kind of fiscal Prohibition, but in that event the State Treasurer, bemoaning shrunken revenue, would have to console himself with reflective thoughts about the moral benefits of his drastic policy. As to the revision of the duty on tobacco, the Prime Minister merely has put a bad mistake in the beginning into his tariff pipe to smoke it at leisure. It is still doubtful whether the readjustment, which is another example of administrative crudity, will yield much assistance to growers of New Zealand tobacco. The best that may be said at the moment is that Mr. Forbes admits the error of his expert departmental advisers, and has the best intentions in respect of correction. The new duties on imported timber represent the nearest approach the Government has yet made toward the clamant necessity of fostering local industry. Admittedly the revised impositions are steep and stiff. Against that, however, must be placed the severe depression of the Dominion’s timber trade which suffers almost a phenomenal blight of unemployment-—a condition, it is said, involving the enforced idleness of five thousand men. Moreover, the extent of importations from North America, in recent years, has been so ruinous for the local timber industry that some drastic restriction was not only essential, but was inevitable. It may be shown later that the new duties are too harsh and oppressive and likely to depress the building trade, but time alone will reveal the strength of any protest of that kind. By far the, worst and most blundering feature of the Government’s proposals is the regrettable fact that these aimed at securing emergency revenue on an inflated scale, instead of having been designed deliberately as a practical method of expanding New Zealand industries.

A SOCIETY’S PLAIN DUTY

THE announcement that the Auckland branch of the New Zealand Society for the Protection of Women and Children will remain aloof from any question as to the suitability or otherwise of the Child Welfare Act is a surprising one. No organisation existing for the purpose of dealing with social problems is more directly concerned with the affairs of the Children’s Court and its attendant system than this useful body, and it is highly desirable that members should be prepared to do everything in their power to put an end to unjust practices if such are found to exist.

At the society’s meeting on Monday its attention was drawn to existing dissatisfaction with the Act and with the Children’s Court by a letter from Mrs. M. B. Soljak. In the columns of The Sun during the past month there have appeared letters from a large number of citizens, all of whom have criticised the present methods of dealing with juvenile offenders and particularly the disquieting secrecy surrounding the activities of the Children’s Court. When interviewed recently, representative social workers and members of the legal profession raised doubts as to whether the Act was being put into opertaioh wisely or successfully, and expressed the opinion that the time had come for a thorough review of the system. This earnest of public disapproval should be sufficient to convince the society that the question is one of importance to the whole community—one that should be dealt with in thorough and logical fashion by an investigation of the Child Welfare system. In her letter to the society Mrs. Soljak made a general criticism of the Act and the Children’s Court. The chairman, the Rev. W. Jcilie, pointed out that there was nothing specific in her charges, and it was decided to ask for details of actual cases, all of which the society would investigate at once. As far as it went this was a most reasonable view, and Mrs. Soljak may be expected to substantiate her claims with detailed evidence. But, if definite cases of hardship and injustice are disclosed, will the society insist upon acting in a curative rather than a preventive capacity? In the event of cases of hardship and cruelty under the Act being proven, the society (according to Mr. Jellie’s statement) will be placed in the awkward position of having to battle .with the effect while showing tacit approval of the cause. But on second thoughts no social worker, least of all Mr. Jellie, would wish to shelter New Zealand’s Child Welfare system if it be branded justly as an undesirable failure. Plainly it is the duty of the society, on behalf of those whom it protects, to lend all possible assistance in seeking the truth. If a general investigation is not favoured at this stage, a determined effort should be made either publicly or by the society to leai-n tlie facts in individual cases. Even one example of veiled injustice would be sufficient to warrant a frank, public examination of the Child Welfare organisation.