THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. FRIDAY, OCTOBER 23, 1908. NOT ALL IN ONE BASKET.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 3025, 23 October 1908, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. FRIDAY, OCTOBER 23, 1908. NOT ALL IN ONE BASKET.

Speaking at Feilding, on Tuesday last, Sir Joseph Ward, whose optimism is of a mo3t ex traordinary character, made use of a favourite phrase of his when he declared that all our eggs are not now in one basket. Happily, there is some truth in the contention, but our eggs are still sufficiently in onu basket to make the fall in the price of wool a very serious matter to the whole country. This was a point that the Premier did not emphasise, neither did he tell his admiring audience that the drop in wool last year is estimated to have reduced the value of the Dominion's exports by £3,000,000. Any remarks of the kind would have been of the nature of cold facts, and not at all in keeping with the "glittering policy" which Sir Joseph is frantically dantrlii.g before the eyes of the Those people in this country, who have not previously realised the trend

of Liberal Administration during the past ten years, or so, are about to learn that it is the people, and not the Government, who pay for the extravagance of the latter. Acts of Parliament—there were only one hundred Acts passed last sessi on—cannot produce prosperity. Real prosperity is produced not borrowed. Political harangues, and Arbitration Court awards, will not make the people prosperous, unless the producers of the country are doing well, and unless the industries are allowed to thrive and develop in a natural way. Our eggs may not be all in one basket, but this country cannot afford to smash a £3,000,000 egg (and there is thu prospect of breaking another equally large one), yet this is what Sir Joseph Ward is, practically, telling the electors. In its latest issue the "Mercantile Gazette" pertinently observes: —"There is danger in the present situation, the danger of a violent collapse. What is needed now is a strong sane effort at economy and retrenchment in publie and private life; if this is not undertaken at once, it will be forced upon us in a manner that will not be appreciated."