THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. THURSDAY, MARCH 17, 1927. A NATIONAL PROBLEM.

Wairarapa Age, 17 March 1927, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. THURSDAY, MARCH 17, 1927. A NATIONAL PROBLEM.

In the course of a spirited reply to criticisms of the measures taken by the Government to relieve unemployment, the Prime Minister has said that the country is faced temporarily by a national problem, and that nothing <s to bo gained from a national point of view by etteim ting to make political capital out .of such, a situation. Mr. Coates would have been quite justified in going further and saying that those whx) are out of work through no fault, of their own have no worse friends than people who are advocating and demanding an extravagant policy of relief. Unemployment on its present scale has developed because of a falling off in national income which has enforced reductions In both public and private expenditure. A remedy is to be fpund, not in relief works, which are merely a temporary though necessary palliative, but in the restoration by economy and in other ways of conditions which will permit and ensure a full tide of industrial activity in town and country. An extravagant expenditure on relief works would delay very seriously the restoration of these conditions, and therefore would work out badly for those who are or may be unemployed.

The Prime Minister went to the roeft of the matter in observing that it must be recognised that the greater the sum spent on relief, “the longer will our return to a normal state of affairs be delayed.” As Mr. Coates observed in elaborating this point: Money does not come out of a hat, and any thinking man will agree that if an undue amount is spent in relieving unemployment it will at no distant date merely have the paradoxical effect of creating further un-

employment. This is perfectly true. Relief works ore in a class by themselves and stand distinctly apart from ordinary industrial operations which are at once productive in themselves and pave the way for further production and employment. The country is already spending fully as much as it can afford—perhaps more than it can afford—on development works of various kinds, and money can only be made available for relief works withdrawing it from channels in which otherwise it would become available sooner or later for the expansion of ordinary industry. The Prime Minister did n&t overstate thd fatES! Iff saying that an undue expenditure in

relieving unemployment would ultimately have the effect of creating further unemployment. He might have said that any expenditure on relief works uses up, for practical purposes, money that otherwise would be avail- < able .for the expansion of industry. This does not mean that relief works are not necessary. It does mean that from the point of view of wage-earn-ers as much as that of anyone else they are a regrettable necessity, and that it is very definitely in the interests of wage-earners that expenditure on relief works should be kept within such reasonable limits as are possible. The payment on relief works of full ordinary rates of wages would not only use up ineffectively money that might be invested and spent in other ways with much greater advantage to the wage-earning population, but would attract and hold men who otherwise would recover normal industrial employment. In other words, this policy would magnify and extend the very problem it is sought to solve. A passage in the Prime Minister’s speech to which full heed should be given is that in which he contends that local authorities, public bodies, and the general public should play their part, in assisting to relieve unemployment. The fact that the resources of many individuals are at present straitened accounts to a. considerable extent for the prevailing unemployment, but individual circumstances vary, and those who are in a position to do so should recognise an obligation to provide all the employment that is possible in such conditions as at present confront the Dominion.