GREAT REFORMS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 77, 17 August 1912, Page 1 (Supplement)

GREAT REFORMS

LIBERAL LAND CRUSADE. London, July 4. The great political fact of to-day ; (writes "P.W.W." in the Daily News and Leader of July sth) is the rise of the land crusade. The movement is spontaneous, and has, I believe, the full sympathy of the Government. Week by week a programme is developing, so courageous and fundamental in its scope that it must be submitted to the electors and determined by them before legislation can be carried. When the three Bills of this session are on the Statute Book and the new register is in force ■the constituencies, doubtless re-distribu-ted, will be asked to choose, for or against, a magnificent hope of social regeneration. It is recognised that the principle of a minimum wage cannot be limited to coal mines and sweated industries. In many counties agricultural labor is economically a sweated trade. and it is argued that if the countryside is not to be yet further denuded of population, a minimum for agricultural laborers must be fixed. On the other hand, there is strong opinion that the condition of the rural laborer will be best treated laterally, through housing access to the land, and co-operation? RATING ON BASIS OP SITE VALUE. Land valuation is proceeding at top speed. A second and profoundly important item in the new programme is the abolition of ('-a hv.ne and factory tax* Rating U to b:> reformed and simplified on the basJ3 01 site value alone —the value secured from the People's Budget. With thi3 will corns a complete reorganisation of local and imperial finance. The great activity of Mr Wedgwood, Mr Hemmenb, Mr Neilson, and other advanced lan] tssci-s is not without significance. Ihese enthusiasts have the support and encouragement of more authoritative spokesmen of Liberalism. Mr Runcimanj for instance, on the Agricultural Estimates, strongly advocated the tax on land as a necessity for the spread of small holdings, since the building tax retarded tie splitting of large farms. The whole subject has been canvassed in the highest Liberal circles and there is no disapproval of a candidature like that of Mr Outhwaite—l speak here without reference to the Labor controversy, SINGLE TAX PROGRAMME. The programme of the single-taxers does not specifically include all that the Government is informally discussing. Housing will be automatically stimulated •by a revision of ratings. But the valuation of land is unquestionably a preliminary to large purchases for'public ends. Labor unrest -must continue as long as the people lack homes worthy of the great commercial prestige of this country under free trade. Town-planning is to-day timid, sporadic, and something of a luxury for lawyers. Authority will be sought to speed up the enterprise and secure for every working man a house where he may live content. A similar remark applies to small holdings. With valuation completed a career will open out, free from feudalism, with security of tenure, for every man of agriculture who wishes to cultivate what is, after all, his native soil. Cottages for. laborers are included in the scheme. The" Board of Agriculture, under Mr Runci'- ; man's inspiration, is preparing standard designs which are calculated greatly to cheapen construction. In these matters Ireland has had a full share of good things. It is now England's turn. POOR LAW REVISION. The programme must of necessity include a complete revision of Poor Law. That is inevitable. Projecting our minds to what will be the condition of affairs three years hence, when a new parliament, based on the Reform Bill, will begin its labors, we at once see that the present Poor Law will have disappeared. The aged will in most part have been rescued from pauperism. So will countless persons suffering from disease and disablement. Unemployment insurance, compulsory and voluntary, will have dried up another tributary to pauperism. The feeble-minded will have been otherwise dealt with. The children will have been boarded out, more and more, in cottage homes, or fed in cases of extreme poverty, through the Education Authority, while medical treatment will have been added to medical inspection. The net result of these reforms will be to render Boards of Guardians no longer necessary, either for poor law or rating. They will be abolished.

CHANCELLOR'S GREAT TASK. These undoubtedly are the great tasks at which Mr Lloyd George hinted in a recent speech. As regards the land movement, questions will be answered by the Prime Minister on Monday. Mr Newman, the Unionist member for Enfield, will ask: "Whether the fact that cerl tain honorable members and ex-members of this House have been requested by Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer to serve on a eommitte dealing with the policy of land reform has been brought to his notice; whether the formation of the said committee has his sanction and approval."

This attempt to drive a wedge between the Prime Minister and Mr'Llovd Gerge, will, I believe fail. It is, indeed, absurd. The confidence between the two statesmen is complete. The attitude of the Government is determined by the fact that grave social unrest is abroad, that at all costs the nation must be preserved from a class war wherein all the workers would be ranged sullenly against the employers and middle class. and that the Liberal party as an instrument for uniting all classes in the common task of progress must, therefore, renew its youth, buckle on its armor, and apply itself to the needs of the day.