The Wairoa Bell, AND Hobson County Gazette. FRIDAY, APRIL 21st.

Wairoa Bell, Volume V, Issue 194, 21 April 1893, Page 5

The Wairoa Bell, AND Hobson County Gazette. FRIDAY, APRIL 21st.

As the time uf the present Parliament is fast coming to a close and the next elections are drawing near politics are becoming of paramount interest ; and those persons who aspire on personal grounds to a seat in the next parliament are beginning to stir themselves in the hope that an early start may avail them. Of such men, however, electors who care anything for their country are well able to judge. It is yet too early to make choice between men, but electors should always be ready to consider parties and principles. Some may object to party government, but while such exists it is im portant that electors should learn the distinctions between the parties. For many years in the history of our country it was difficult to distinguish between parties by an examination of their principles, for there seemed very little between them except that one party were the ins and the other the outs Happily, however, a new party has

arisen, in late yeers, as the voice of the people lias become more potently felt, and the principles of the present Government and those of the Opposition are well defined in many respects. The distinction which seems to stand out most clearly is that the Government have become identified with the Labour Party and their platform, whilst the Opposition are very pronounced in their denunciation of the chief planks in that platform. We are glad that the lines have of late become so well defined, and we are p’eased, too, that the Ministers, who have allied thamselves with the Labour Party, have shewn themselves such able and careful administrators

We cannot, in the space at our disposal, attempt to discuss the several planks in the Labour platforms put forward by different organisations ; nor can we say that we agree with all that has been put forth. The plank, however, which has perhaps been most vigorously assailed by the Opposition press and other writers happens to be one with which we most heartily agree, and one from which it seems strange t.o us that any Christian man should dissent, it is as followß : “ The State to find employment for all those who cannot find it for themselves ” Now this means just what it says and no more ; it docs not mean, as some most unfairly urge, that the State is to find wages for those who will not work, or as our Maropiu correspondent last week put it “ that the State is to find work for all the loafers The Hon. 11. Seddon has plainly shown by his administration that this last is not the case, for when he has met the unemployed for the purpose of finding them work his method of dealing with them has invariably caused the “loafers” to hold aloof; and those who have received assistance from him have rendered full value to the State for the wages paid. One of the strongest points in the honourable gentleman’s administration has been his impartial and firm dealing with the unemployed.

If a man will not work he shall not eat is a good law, but it does not mean that if a man cannot work he shall noteat, for our hospital and charitable aid institutions all say plainly by their very existence that those who cannot work shall be looked after by their more fortunate fellow creatures. It must be very distressing to a man, other than a loafer, to be placed in such a position that he is physically unable to maintain his own existence without the assistance of others, but such a man might find comfort in the thought that what cannot be cured must be endured as a natural course of things. On the other hand a man able and willing to work but unable to find employment because those around him will wot give him the opportunity, must feel that such a state of things is not natural ; and it is surely not asking too much that if such there be the State shall find him something to do. Idle men always are a menace to the State and the finding of work for those who cannot find it for themselves (or even the compelling of idle men to work), must benefit tiie State while it assists the would be worker. All will agree that to help a man out of work to find employment is a kind and neighbourly act, and why then should the State not act in a similar manner ? It will not do for those fortunate ones who know not what it is to be out of work to dismiss the question by saying that anyone can get work in this country who chooses to work, for they but put forth a plea to ease their consciences and they, have no means of verifying their assertion. To say that there are none who cannot find work for themselves is no argument against the principle laid down ; if such be tbe case then the State will have no need to step in, for this plank of the platform only requires the State to act when there are such. We quite agree with those who urge that there is plenty of work in our Colony for each pair of hands in it ; and it is because of this that vve urge that the State should find employment for all those who cannot find it for themselves.

This does not necessarily mean that the State shall itself employ all such men. All that the Labour Party ask is that the Government shall establish Labour Bureaux in which shall be gathered all information having reference to labour, and by the help of which men in search of employment shall be assisted in their quest. If it so happens that the Government with all tbe knowledge in their possession cannot find em • ployinent among the people for a man, then

it becomes a necessity for the State itself to find him employment or maintain him in dleness for no man can be allowed to starve before our eyes. Therefore we maintain the correctness of the principle “thatthe State should find employment for all those who cannot find it for themselves.”