PROTECTION IN VICTORIA.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume IX, Issue 2702, 16 September 1887, Page 2

PROTECTION IN VICTORIA.

The following article reprinted from tho Australasian of August 6th should be of great interest to those who study the question of Freetrade and Protection, seeing that it is the opinion of a leading paper in the groat Protection I Colony of Australasia, " The beginning of protection is a 8 tho letting-,.0u6, of water, There iB no telling where it will end, If when imposing--a new duty the legislature were to pass an act limiting the number of persons who were to take advantage of .it, tbese would accept their dole'and be satis*. u«l, . The immediate effect of a protective duty is to create local : competion. A few years back the woollen mills got along fairly well under a. 10 per cent' tariff. On tho duty being raised to 15, over-manufacturing at oiiee began, and the companies,-. after destroying one another's trade, called but. for wore protection, They obtained an increase of spercent, under the 20per cent, rate they are doing ;worq§ 'than over-ror, at any . rate, some of them say so, .m the name of all. There are two interests to ;be considered—the millowners, who. manufacture tweeds, and the proprietors of . the clothing, factories, who make tweeds up Into clothing, aud do a. large export trade which should command the admiration, of the protectionists, because, in their; .peculiar language," it brings money into the country," The clothing fact-, ones employ far.more hands than the woollen-mills, and the trade they do is profitable, - Now, the effect' of piling up the duty on woollen goods, will be to diminish the exporting or paying trade, .while, on the other' handj' no lasting good will come to the raillown- . ejs.for; they will compete more/fiercelythan ever. Very similar is : the case of the saw-mill owners, -there hafbeeff a very large increase in the saw-milling business of recent years,; In the pres- ■ ent agitation regarding hardwood, the country mill-owners, who are outting up more timber than they can dispose of locally, demand the exclusion of the Tasmanian woods, so that they may be able to sell as cheaply iu town aa the the town hiillowners, Will the proposed -remedy do any good 11n a little while the country millowners will be in the same fixasthe woollen mill-own-ers. The duke'Bß of the trade is sinply due to over-production, an .evil which the customs tariffa will not oure." . i