The Flight of Time

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1064, 30 August 1930, Page 6

The Flight of Time

N.Z. DROPPING BEHIND

Vital Need for An Industrial Revival

WHILE time passes by New Zealand industrially is marking time, and to stand still while other countries are forging: ahead means dropping behind. That is a serious menace to the well-being of any country, and an industrial revival is vital for that progress and national development which means a maintenance of prosperity. While we stand still stagnation is inevitable, and the call of the hour is for industrial progress.

Other countries have been busy reorganising: and rationalising their industries during the post-war years, and after filling the demands of their local markets are eagerly seeking markets abroad where the surplus of high-pressure production can be dumped, often to bo sold at lower prices than those obtaining in the country of origin, where the local manufacturers have a monopoly of their home market, and can fix prices accordingly. NEW ZEALAND FALLING BEHIND During this period there is scarcely an industry in New Zealand which lias made any marked progress. Some have remained about stationary in their annual output; others have declined; and we are still the greatest importing country iu the world in proportion to our population, eagerly buying the products of foreign countries while our own industries are languishing and our workers idle. In seven years, employees in the sawmilling, sash and door industries have decreased from 0,135 to 7,305; farming machinery workers, from 1.080 to 779; tannery employees, from 1 .157 to S7S; motor-body and coachbuilding, from 1,066 to 1,469; saddlery and harness-making, from 424 to 261.

Big manufacturing industries like our woollen mills, clothing and footwear factories, have had a hard struggle to maintain their output, and engineering has dropped back in production. It is these unpleasant facts which point beyond question to the causes of trade depression, slackness

of business, shortage of money, and une m pi oy ment. It is not that ws are wearing less clothes or boots and shoes, or that there are less motor-cars, farm machines, and implements, or that less timber is being used. We have lessened home production to send our work out of the country, and so impoverished ourselves that everyone is now beginning to feel the pinch when prices of our staple exports begin to . fall. | A glance at some of our bill for imported goods last year soon shows where the money has gone. Here are a few items: £ Apparel and ready - made clothing 2.250,000 Boots and shoes 1,067,000 Iron and nails . . .... . . 705,000 Timber 790.000 Paints and varnishes . . . . 434,000 Glassware 359,000 Hats, caps, and millinery . 356.000 Agricultural machinery .. 2.4,000 Woollen goods 743,000 Those are not luxuries, but goods in every-day use. which we could and ' should make for ourselves, while many luxuries such as tobacco, cigarettes, confectionery, pickles, sauces, preserved fruits and jams, can be made equally well here by our own labour from our own materials. SELF-RELIANCE AND SELFRESPECT Our dependence on outside sources for the necessities of life is an admis-

sion of inferiority, and a policy 0 , self-reliance and self-dependence increase our national sense of self respect and independence. figures for unemployment again show a rising tendency, and if the paymenof a sustenance allowance to our workers ever comes into operation we may look for a phenomenal j, crease in the number of uneßp! OT „ registered, as many of them nw now bother to register officially ‘ It would not mean much erntir down of our imports to provide ductive work for all our unemplovL" and a further reduction would n'eT; an increased population to meet demand for our locally-made goo* As it is, production is stationarv ani , our population naturally remains th same, as we cannot find employment for those already here, and the ir creased burden of taxation has to fall on the same number of shoulders A GLANCE AT ‘‘HANSARD" A look through the scores of pag.and many thousands of words devote! in Parliament to the debate on i Unemployment Bill shows how ti t combined wisdom of our utterly fails to realise the real ca*t of depression and unemployment, am the only permanent cure. The Primt Minister is found admitting that whave been living beyond our inconi and the drop in our national incomis attributed .entirely to falling pric« in farm products. But if that drop raw materials and foodstuffs could b recouped by greater production o; wealth from our manufacturing rv sources the cycle of low prices foexports -would not be felt to the ei tent it is, and by making the increast of local production permanent the benefit would still accrue if oversea; prices improve again. CUT DOWN SPENDING ABROAD The golden remedy is for the people to combine on a campaign to cut dowr. expenditure on imports, and use ther raonev to employ our own worker, instead of outsiders. We have been living beyond our income, and that the road to trouble for countries as well as individuals. We have beer, ordering goods from abroad which «-•- have not been able to pay for. and most of the countries supplying them refuse to take our goods in exchange The remedy is obvious in such a case. Keep our workers at work before sending our work overseas. Demand New Zealand-made goods