The Daily News. MONDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1918. THE COST OF LIVING.

Taranaki Daily News, 7 October 1918, Page 4

The Daily News. MONDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1918. THE COST OF LIVING.

The cost-of-living question is engaging more attention to-day than ever before, for the reason that it is pressing increasingly hard upon practically every family, particularly 011 the working and smaller salaried man. It was only natural that this problem should be one of the chief points of discussion at the meetings in connection with the present by-election. Both candidates, howe ( ver, appear to have given the subject very little thought, or, if they have, theyj have failed to suggest any practic-j able means ol'.alleviation. At his Friday meeting Mr. Connett suggested, as one way of helping the workers to meet the steady rise in the cost of necessities, that they tiliould work an hour or two a day extra at,overtime rates,, instancing the number of hours the average farmer puts in. Bui the suggestion would not afford the desired relief It has.been proved that

long hours cause deterioration in a man's physical 'powers, and a decrease in output; also that the average man can do as much work in eight hours as he can in nine. Pew employers will willingly provide overtime —for that reason. They know from experience that it would he better to engage further hands. If extra labor is not available, then, of course, they have no option but to ask thenmen to work overtime, though only if the exigencies of the work require it. The difference between the artisan and the farmer is that the latter is working for himself and therefore he does not spare himself, feeling that the time will come when he will be able to slacken off considerably, or retire altogether from active labor. The working man has no 1 such prospect. If he is engaged in hard manual work or in work that tries his nerves, eight Jiours' work faithfully performed is.quite sufficient. No_; we must look elsewhere for relief. There can, of course, be no absolute relief, for the simple reason that we are living in a time of war, when everything is completely "upset. The cost of the neeessaries of life are mainly affected by the expense of production, and every increase in wages' and material is passed on to the consumer, with, probably, a considerable percentage added. The war has given an unprecedented impetus to exploitation, and that is why the lot o.f the worker, in spite of increased wages, has arrived at a point where alleviation has become necessary. Higher wages are not everything. As a rule they further increase the cost of living. In our view more should be done to enable the worker to help himself. The Government, for instance, might purchase lands adjoining towns, cut them up into three or five-acre allotments, and advance the worker the required money to build a house and purchase stock. If the worker had, say, a couple of cows, a pig or two, kept fowls and grew his own vegetables and feed, he would be able to provide very largly for his household. In the town a large iamily is ,a heavy liability; on the land it is a valuable asset. We see no reason why a scheme something on these lines should not be attempted. At present few workers can save money to enable them to buy suburban places of this doscription, but a Government sincerely desirous of helping the workers would not hesitate to provide the wherewithal to give effect to ■the proposal, which has the merit of increasing production, and making the worker more self-re-liant. That there is a good'deal of profiteering going on in New Zealand to-day cannot be denied. We have a Board of Trade, supposed to regulate prices in certain lines but anyone acquainted with its operations knows that the board tails far short of requirements, principally because the board's powers are so circumscribed. We would have a differently constituted board set up, composed of representatives of the wholesale trade, the retail trade, and the consumers, and give it plenary power to deal with all necessities—a power it does not enjoy to-day. Another contributing cause of the increasing cost of living is to be found in the exactions of thb shipping rings. We have personal knowledge of one commodity the freight on which before the war was £4 per ton, and is now £27. Can anyone say that this tremendous rise can be justified on any ground whatever .- It cannot. The goods have to be brought to New Zealand; the shipping concerns know this, and levy practically what they like. The charge, of course, is passed on to the publr. Unfortunately we are now at the mercy of the shipping sharks, but the lesson should not be lost on us. We should render impossible the repetition of such reprehensible conduct on the part of ocean carriers by seeing that the people of New Zealand have their own ships in the near future, thus taking a leaf out of Australia's book. Had our legislators been inspired by a desire to protect the interests of New Zealand they never would have allowed the Union Company to be absorbed by the shipping octopus that now has control; they would have taken over the ships on behalf of New Zealand. It is safe to say that a very large part of the workers' wages to-day is going indirectly to the voracious shipping companies. There are other ways of easing the lot of the workers. For instance, by giving free medical attention to those in receipt of less than a stated wage, acting on the principle that prevention is better than cure, also oa the fact that the basis of a country's prosperity is the good health of its people. Under present conditions the fear of doctors' and dentists' bills is to the family of the working man almost a nightmare, and it is in the best interests of the State that it should be lifted from him. This, however, is a very large subject to which we may return on another occasion. We merely mention it here as part of the programme we would like to see carried out in the interests of the man who is "up against it," and who must continue to be so

unless we, as a community, do more than we are doing at present on his behalf.