A NECESSARY DEPRIVATION.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 December 1941, Page 4

A NECESSARY DEPRIVATION.

J)RASTIC as they are and severely as they will be felt, the restrictions announced by the Government on the use of petrol, not only by private persons, but in many commercial and other services hitherto regarded as essential of course are to be accepted cheerfully as in the category of things needed to put the country on a war footing. So far as pleasure and convenience are concerned, no question can arise. It will be time enough to look at matters again from that standpoint when the war has been won. Where the important services that alone can now be regarded as having legitimate claims are concerned, all that can now be done is to make the best and most effective use that is possible of available resources. It has been said, in the official announcement on the subject of petrol restrictions, that the livelihood of some people will be affected, but this of course calls for equitable and efficient adjustment as a part of the organisation of the Dominion for war. Where people are deprived of their livelihood by action taken for the defence and safety of the State, they must be provided with other means of livelihood, and that should not be difficult. Many things must now be done without, but it is not simply by doing without or by the curtailment of activities hitherto customary that we shall make a worthy contribution to the winning of the war. That will be done rather by keying the whole working force*, as well as the fighting force, of the community to the highest practicable pitch of energetic and effective action.

In the right conditions of enterprising organisation now very obviously demanded, any useful and capable worker' displaced at one point will speedily be absorbed at another. Any neglect of this phase of war organisation would not only be cruelly unjust to individuals, but would be gravely detrimental to the Dominion. It has never been more-, necessary than in this time of unexampled crisis and emergency that the whole, of the working power of the community should be employed at full strength and brought to bear either directly in furtherance of the war effort or in sustaining the life of our own population and others and meeting the most essential needs.