THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. MONDAY, AUGUST 19, 1912. THE UNITED LABOUR PARTY.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10697, 19 August 1912, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. MONDAY, AUGUST 19, 1912. THE UNITED LABOUR PARTY.

The United Labour Party of .New Zealand is fortunate in having ;ecurcd tlio services of so skilful an advocate as tlio Hon. George Fowlds Possibly there as no other gentleman in the Dominion who is more fitted, for the position of leader than the exMinister. A man of high ideals, conscientious and clean-living, ho will command respect wherever he goes, and.if thetti e should over come that Labour controls a majority in the House, the claims of the Hon. George Fowlds. to the highest position in the land will be irresistible. At the same, time, one cannot help thinking that his views, and those of the Party he represents, are based upon a wrong conception of the demands cf evon a democratic community. There is much in the platform of the Labour Party which will commend itself to tlio intelligent thinker, 'hut there is a great deal which is thoroughly impracticable. Tit his address in Masterton on Saturday night, 'Mr Fowlds devoted considerable attention to the question of taxation, and as this appears to he the most important plank in the Labour plat term, we propose reviewing it at some length. A few years laack the Labour Party clamoured for a protective duty, for the. stimulating of local industries. It also insisted •upon the nationalisation of the land, it now abandons Protection, and appears to attach very little importance to the question of land tenure. What it demands is that the Custom* duties shall be removed, and that the loss of revenue shall bo made up by an increased tax on land. Mr Fowlds contends that the landless people of the Dominion are entitled to a portion of the increment which has been created .in land by the expenditure of borrowed millions, together with the developments of science. In-effect, Mr Fowlds states that the landowner is, not entitled to the benefits derived I from the refrigerator, the gfceam-en-gine, and the milking-machine hecausp j he has not earned them. He holds that the advantages should be shared by the whole community. He apparently overlooks th» fact that ai large portion of the increased wealth created by invention is expended in labour and in derelopig tha resources of the country. Aoart from tUwcon-

skieratiion, he iy suroly advocating a dangerous principle when he suggests that anything that 19 not actually earned by the individual should be divisible among the whole co7nmunity. Such an advocacy is communism pure aaid simple. If the man- uponi the land is not entitled to' the advantages derived from the refrigerator or the milking-machine, the tradesman is not entitled to the advantage ho reaps from the wool or the cotton-mill. Tho principle might be extended to every branch of human industry, and nobody would b e permitted to call anything his own that he did not actually earn. If the argument were canned to its logical conclusion, the shearer would suffer, for ho would have to show that he hay actually earned the money h c is paid for shearing sheep by machinery. Every labouring man would he compelled to disgorgo anything that had been created by any means outside his own exertion. What lias the community done that it should ehare in the profit of the refrigerator? Has it dono anything? The voty argument of Mr Fowldg supplies its own. condemnation for if the landowner is to be taxed upon what he has not earned, the community which benefits by such taxation, having given no return for the tax so derived, should also be made to pay. The ialea is altogether preposterous. But let us analyse the question of unearned increment a little closer. Mr Fowlds states that the comm.tit.ity is responsible through the Customs' for the borrowed millions which have kvn expended on railways and other public works to increase* the value of land. Is he not aware that the general community lias .already received back in wages, etc, a large slice of the money expended on. public works P And if the railways and public .services increase the value of land, do they not also increase the facilities offered the community for gaining a livelihood? Are the railways and public buildings constructed for the special benefit of the land-owner, or for tho good of the eommuniity? Are no allowances to be made the man upon the lamd fdr his isolation and his deprivation of the comforts of town life? Have not -towiv dwellers derived an equel advantage with country settlo.iv, from the expenditure of public moneys ? Mr Fowlds admits that they have, for he states that he proposes making thp large owner of land in the oity contribute an increased quota of taxation on account of the growth of city land values. And it i s here that th? weakness of Mr Fowlds' theory presents itself. He lis careful to select the city owwer, so that it may not be supposed that he is singling out the farmer for increased taxation. But is h e not aware that the city land holder bears mo I portion of the taxation ? In .nine I ca,ses out of ten he is not the occu- ■ I pier of the land. If he is called upon to pay extra taxation, he immediately j passes it on to his tenant, arid the t tenant, if he be a tradesman, passes it on to the consumer. And so tho community pays as before. In the ease of the rural landowner, however, he has no means of parsing on the taxation. He has to pay, and K-'> happy. Tt will thus be seen that' 'thp taxation of land values, which is another name for the single-tax, is directed solely at the rural owner. It is absurd for Mr Fowlds to sav that the ■small farmer would not suffer by an increase of a penny in the .joun.l 111 the land tax. He states that onlv one-fourth of tho landowners of the Dominion own land of the uniinprovcvl va'.c of over .-£."00. He i*. o{ course, including urban owners in hh osculations. Let him make his assessment on those in the country, who nay the tax and havp no means of passing it on. He will then have quite a different tale to tell. Mr Fcwlds does not tell us how he proposes dealing with holders of .len-ps-in-peroe-tuity, who are exempt from taxati/vi under the terms of their leases. .Nor does he state how he proposes dealing witli lauds which are subject to heavy mortgage. His whole proposal is fundamentally wrong, for the .reason that it provides no effective mens for imposing taxation upon those winarc best able to bear it, particularly in the cities. If he was to advocate the imposition of a gr -dilated income tax. with exemptions' on account of dependents alone, he would be getting a good deal .nearer to the realisation of the ideal of equity. '