The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE. TUESDAY, MAY 25, 1920. A NOVEL SHIPPING PROPOSAL.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume XI, Issue 3495, 25 May 1920, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE.

TUESDAY, MAY 25, 1920. A NOVEL SHIPPING PROPOSAL.

With which is incorporated “The Taihape Post and Waimarino News,”

The shipping problem is looked ‘upon by most leading farmers, and certainly by farming Members of Parliament, as being the corner stone of the incubus with which the farming industry is oppressed. The want. of shipping compels the farmer to sell and send his meat and wool» just where those who own shipping are pleased To take‘ them, and were it not for that fact there would be highly pi-ofitahle markets in the world that he could exploit, but which are now the prerogative ef the American Meat Trust,‘ 5 America is indeed a great country, virile, energetic and industrious, but in its development its enterprise has Caused it to go off at a

gtangent in its impatience to acquire :1-iches; it has sought some royal road [to greatness. and, not descerning the {social pitfalls, it has pressed’ along ithat alluring short cut until it is beginning to wonder Whether it does not also lead to complete social (lestruction. Greed and avarice, the desire of individuals to possess riches they nor their children could ever use in a natural Way for their own or for the national good. has lured them in--Ito dark, devious and speculative political and social ways which are proving, now, to end in anarchy and Bolshevism. Greed and avarice in other countries. part.icul-arly in the British Empire is imitating that of American birth, and it is; producing precisely similar resultsui Present day anarchy is the antithesis‘ of commercialism, and is of just as natural BA gl'nwth_ As C01]l11)G1'Ci£11iS1‘l1i

is going headlong by ways to .<’i.upendous riches, so Anarchy is taking a short cut to destroy cominercialism, stem its onrush ,and secure more equal opportunities for all. What should by safe Ways and methods take a. century to attain commercialism and

anarchy are striving to accomplish in a week_ Then ararchy is ‘beget of commercialism and one is just :13 natural a condition as the other. The vsjithholding of ships from taking New Zealand produce to ‘those markets where it is most wanted, to people who are in the last stages: of starvation who are prepared to pay highest prices for it _is’no less a. crime against sociefythan an engineered upheaval of labour by anarchists, and it is as well that people shonld get all such acts of commercialism and anarchy into the tl‘ll€_ Perspective, not magnifying one and minishing the Either. The anarchist in his strike cares not for the

inconvenience and misery he bringé about. and shipping rings (751776 nothing about the starvation of men Women and

Children where meat is xvantedgtheb’ will =enly‘ta.ke it to Where tlle_Colllnlel-

cialist class ‘can keep ‘control. of it, enabling thelll_lo exploit both consumer and pl‘oducé'l" ‘EO the utmost. This be!ing obvious it behaves New Zealand |pro'ducel's to avoid all proposals for provision of shipping that are tainted. with commercialism. Only a few years ago people of this Dominion had good and just cause to feel great pride in their own shipping lines and companies, ‘but, where are the magnificent merchant fleets to-day? Zew Zealaud Ship-owners became converts to coinmercialism and the ships, of which producers and traders and people were so proud, are now in strange waters; carrying produce from any other country to the best and most profitable markets of the world, but taking virtually none from New Zealand. This Dominion’s meat is deteriorating in cold store.‘ damming back the usual flow of meat ‘into freezing works. holding up production and marketing of stock, with their result-j lant disappointing decreases in‘ values. The question is, will farmers and people of these Pacific Islands again risk the ships absolutely necessary for talciing their produce to market in the hands and keeping of commercialists land profiteers? Is it ‘discreet to neglect bitter experience and once more build up a fleet of merchantmen to be used to the disadvantage oi‘: New Zealand in the tfine of arrest need? Can modern commercialism again be trusted with the sole rightand power to connect this country with the markets of the old world? Will farmers, manufacurers and people with the shippl'flg‘shortage they are now eiperiencing through the sale of every New Zealaud ship to foreign shipping combines, -again put their ‘head into the commercialist, the combine noose? 'lt -has been stated by authorities that Lthis Dominion’s progress and develop‘ment has been set back half-a-century by the loss of its gripping. If this is only partially true is it wise to establish a life and death organisation in the control of men who would be as prone to leave the country sliipless just as_ others have done who deemed it to their persoanl advantage to do so, and cared nothing how ‘the“people fared‘ who had helped to make their shipping valuable? :,2 These oteari begirt Islands ar.e thousands oi.’ miles from where the produce raised thereon has to be marketed; is it not sheer lunacy to trust. to any person or organisation other than the whole c-om-munity represented ‘by Government, to establish a bridge over those thousands of miles of ocean that can never break down, let- alone collapse inrthe hour of its greatest need? These are phases _!O-f the great marketing problem that must be faced in the not far distant future, for we are authoritatively advised by he who is best able to speak thereon, that trusts, combines, rings and syndicates have come to stay in the British Empire, as they have stayed and operated in America. Mr McLeod. MTP. for Wairarapa, is interesting himself inthe shipping problem; he undoubtedly means well, but to urge that farmers should be put on the same basis for borrowing as are local governing bodies, who borrow for the establishment of: legitimate public works, is “surely advocating a. course that would recoil on them with hydra.-headed vengeance. A multiple pledging of‘ the public estate could only result in destruction of the public credit, more especially if the pledging is by private individual.s. Mr vMcLeodfs proposal is speculaticn run to seed, a. wild cat suggestion, a frenzy of finance worthy of the most advanced wallowers in commercialism. It

is 11m-easonabie to iissuine that farmers are entitled to privileges under law and government denied to other sections of the community, and, of course, the comnlimity would promptly shout down any privilege ‘that Could not be granted to and enjoyed by uil_

To epitomise Mr .\lcLeod’s proposal

310 is asking Government to find the moneygto establish a shipping line to be owned by farmers, worked and conducted by farmers. If it Days farmers are fo keep‘ for themselves the whole of tlie profits, the State only receiving back its principle and interest thereon; if a failure what H 1011? Mr McLeod has no}? ‘ciealt with .+hat aspect: of the proposed ventm-r_=.

Ducks and rakes -have been Dl3-yed with the Ce-onstitution_. and the coun-

fry Will not permit. anything further

in that connection taking place withlout creating some shindy as may result in complete social wreck. Shipping is the one essential need of this island

country: on shipping must. and Will depend its progress. but these are times in wl;ich it is the soul of wis-

610111 to 171-actice political circur'xislJ<‘C

tion. If Government is to find money for shipping let it be for a State line pure and simple, not for a. farmers’. I 1 manufacturers’. a workers’ or for 11 line ownea and run for profit by" any combination of them, to the exclusion of the State and others. NOW Zealand is .p's.ssing through a shipping experience it never anticipateff, but Why advocate a repetition of"an everlasting extension of ‘such an experience?