CRISIS IN QUEENSLAND.

Taranaki Daily News, 16 March 1922, Page 8

CRISIS IN QUEENSLAND.

WHAT IS THE CAUSE? THE SOWING—AND THE REAPING. Thus a New Zealander who has just returned from an extended trip to Queensland to a New Zealand Times’ reporter: — “Judging from reports that we hear, Australia, and more particularly the State of Queensland, is passing through a period of depression that must, unless quickly rectified, inevitably end in disaster. Not only State, 'but private enterprise must be effected as well. The root cause of it, as with nearly every other evil, is money, or the lack of it. Scarcity of this very necessary commodity has left unfinished or unstarted much of that work that must, for the progress of the country, be completed. As a natural result of such a depressed fluctuation in the money market, many hundreds have been thrown out of work, and have joined in the immense army of the unemployed. Retrenchment is going on in every branch of the Government service, including the railway and public works. Were it not that the Government has met the difficulty in a more or less satisfactory way—to the over-bur-dened taxpayers—by providing these many thousands with rations sufficient to live upon, their plight would indeed be sorry. WHAT IS THE CAUSE. “These many thousands are not confined to the larger centres only, but even to the bush and on those far away outback stations, where in times gone by it was almost impossible to obtain men. Now, in almost every part of the country one goes are to be seen hundreds and hundreds of men walking around the country with their worldly possessions upon their backs vainly searching for work. The majority of these, wore they given the chance, would prove themselves honest and capable workers, and quite willing to give a fair day’s work for a fair day’s wage.

“What has been the cause of such an immense slump in the labor market in nearly every part ofthe State? Is it I bad government, the people themselves, or the financiers of London, who are to blame? As one who has travelled over a great portion of Queeensland, within the last six months, and has had access to the honest opinions of the working classes themselves, as well as the farmers and land-owners, I shall endeavor to explain what these people, who are all so vitally concerned, consider the root cause of what is fast approaching to the status of a national disaster, without infringing upon the many complicated points of the country’s finances. SOWING THE SEEDS. “As a natural aftermath, and consequence of the great war. which has, we are told, demoralised and upset all the once important industries of Central Europe, wool, meat, and most Australian produce has fallen with a terrific thud, when the present-day prices are compared with those of three or four years ago. It is barely to be wondered at. when it is taken into account, that the producers have to pay higher wages and more taxation, that they must be feeling the pinch acutely. We need only to take the case of the wool-grower to realise this fact ourselves. The shearing expenses total up to a large sum, when it is remembered that they have to pay as much as £2 a hundred for the bare shearing alone, as well as £4 10s per week to every rouseabout employed in the shed, whether Jie works his full week or not. On top of this there is the latter’s tucker bill to be paid, which seldom comes to less than thirty shillings a week; it depends principally upon the distance of the railway whether it comes to more or less. Is it likely, .then, when he has the carting of his wool to add to this, and the uncertain price he receives for it, in addition to the many necessary e??penses attached to its production, that he is going to pay away what would practically amount to unnecessary expenditure, by employing labor he can do without? On stations that, when times were better, they employ three hands, they now only employ one. And they have found out, to the working man’s diseomforture, that the one man can almost do the work of three, although his scope of country may not perhaps be quite so clean or well looked after. “REAPING THE WHIRLWIND.” “Daily in Brisbane, both morning and evening, there are meetings of the unemployed, who are continually indicting and apostrophising the Government (Labor) for the ineffectual and apparently indifferent ipanner in which it goes about to alleviate the distress. On top of this, they lay at its feet every vestige of harm that has been done to them and the State, which latter was once perhaps the must prosperous of the five. They blame the Government for the short working hours and high wages, which are. to their way of thinking, the principal causes of the great problem of unemployment. There is an element of unconscious humor in this, when one considers that these same unemployed were once probably the loudest advocators of shorter hours and higher wages. Circumstances, however, alter cases, and as they only too truly point out, what is the use of high wages if you are not securing them? They only serve to keep the cost of living up, thereby making things much more difficult for those who are now in receipt of a regular salary. “BADLY MISMANAGED.” “The conditions in Queensland would have been much worse were it not for the fact that the sugar yield this year has been a record one. But it has been only a temporary respite, and • by this time will be just about over, and some more thousands of men will be thrown upon the already overburdened labor market. It is a pity that Queensland has been so badly mismanaged, for if things were only different it could be one of the most productive countries in the world. It will grow almost anything, including cotton and all tropical fruits, besides the many productions of the colder climates. Perhaps some day she will seize her chance and forge ahead to such an extent that she will be almost unrecognisable to those who know her as she now is. But how long it will be before she does definitely alter for the better it is a difficult thing to say, and almost impossible to give anything like a reliable forecast.”