Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 1919. REPATRIATION TROUBLES.

Taihape Daily Times, 1 February 1919, Page 4

Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 1, 1919. REPATRIATION TROUBLES.

(With whieh ia Incorporated The Taihnpe Peat and Walesatlao News).

Tixe manner in which the present Government is dealing with soldier settlement and repatriation gives one the impression that the Minister in Charge has a very unpleasant duty. He is compelled to make some pretence at performing, and only does that which he has positively to be whipped-up into doing. Very much has been none m Britain for the reception of return*.men into civil life, and yet there are dismissals of men and women, who have carried on while the men were away, in such large numbers that the whole phalanx of labour has become alarmed at the number of workless hands, which are daily increasing. The whole economic system in Britain is disorganised from the old fear of starvation through want of work, and t. men in hundreds of thousands are striking for shorter hours and no overtime so that the volume of work available may go all round; may be shared with the demobilised returned men. The complaint of the men is against the unpreparedness of turning loose upon the labour market some hundreds of thousands of repatriated men. The position in Britain is similar to the position in New Zealand; the Government will not release food that has been stored for carrying on the war; neither will it release building materials so that the returning men may be housed without having to witness the eviction of the worker occupants. The trouble is not caused by employers, for from the most authentic source it is learned that their sympathies are very largely with the, men. The secretary of the Federation of General. Workers i publicly announced that he was extremely gratified that; employers generally were regarding industrial problems from a new standpoint. Employers freely admit that men and women had been overworked and underpaid, and they are showing a genuine desire to bring about a better state of things. The great fear amongst labour is that 1 every avenue will be so flooded that j want, in the near future, must result in catastrophic conditions. It is the | failure of those who hold the reins'd'f Government to make any semblance of ample provision for absorbing the millions of returning soldiers into civil occupations, which is resulting in tens of thousands of hands being turned out of works and factories so that soldiers may have their positions. Labour is becoming desperate under such comb tions in Britain, and it is disquieting to note that Government ineptitude seriously promises to result in similar troubles in New Zealand. The pretence of soldier settlement is little more than ridiculous; a piece of land here and there, wherever someone of the old conservative school wants change his holding for present higH prices, is taken for soldier settlement, but it is obvious that the land must be j reflected in the coming lessened remu- | neration farmers are going to receive j for their produce. Unless prices are j maintained on the present high level j soldiers cannot continue to hold the ! allotments they have been put on to. Members of the present Government know quite well what is going to happen; they know that all the elements of depression, and starvation, and bankruptcy are in the air, why do they so pigheadedly refuse to prepare to avert their fall? We can suggest nothing but that it is the old conservative instinct at work; they have established conditions which permit only soldiers with some money to take up land; returned men scoff at the Government’s pretensions; they speak with derision, and they scorn the nonsense about the fact of being a soldier and having fought and suffered, and bled for the land entitling him to a piece of it to live upon. The soldier says that his right to land depends upon whether he has money; if he has money he can, perhaps, get a section if he is I prepared to accept isolation from his 1 old home and people. The soldier says j that fighting entitling him to a scctioi I is utter bosh, dissembling drivel; i money is the qualification he must posj sess if he wants to obtain a place that will furnish him with tho means of life and rid him of the fear of want overtaking him and his family. A deputation of returned men waited on Sir John Findlay this week and Complained of the Government lack of system and vigour in their resettlement schemes. The deputation said soldiers' were alarmed at the inadequacy of provision made in the face of Su James Allen’s statement that the men would be all back within" nine months. They pointed out that unless immediate energetic and systematic action was taken in acquiring suitable land for soldiers, this hcst-of-all schemes for finding occupation for returned men would be scandalously defeated. They urged that coinpulsory clauses of the law be set In motion; they prayed that the good old special settlement provi-

elons be resurrected, so that soldiers might combine in a special settlement society, find land for themselves, which they claim they could do, much more successfully than any Land Purchase Board. It is imperative that if very bad times arc to be averted there must be a much greater volume of production, and the soldiers are quite right in urging that?*' Government is doing worse than nothing to save the people by that, the only, means of starvation. A mass meeting of soldiers in Wellington, held on Wednesday night, pervaded by utmost enthusiasm, condemned the Government provision for repatriation; they want a Minister of Repatriation who will be responsible to the country, not the colourless national squad of Ministers who are responsible to nobody but themselves. Other matters in connection with repatriation were heatedly discussed, but the meeting lustily cheered a proposal that candidates at the coming general elections should be plied with questions on matters of vital importance to returned soldiers. Returned mien are alarmed, and the general public wait in' suspense and expectation while Government persists in its do-nothing policy; while it makes a political foofball of this life and death situation. In Britain, soldiers and labour have realised that combines of capable controlling industry are clogging repatriation wheels; they realise that tens of thousands are being thrown out to let soldiers come in, and they, naturally, are alarmed at the only result such savagery in dealing with the employment question can have. New Zealand is far removed from the vortex of class war; with increased settlement, augmented earning capacity, every section of the community could be kept prosperous and happy while social and industrial matters were fought to a finish in the Old Land. By the adoption of sane views this country can avoid being drawn into the disruptive melee now commencing to rage furiously in Britain. Controlled and confined labour is beginning to hurst the witues with which it is bound, why not insist upon a loosening policy that will avert social and industrial revolution that may hold the Empire back from pro-' gross during many years?