PUBLIC OPINION

Waikato Times, Volume 124, Issue 20734, 18 February 1939, Page 9

PUBLIC OPINION

As expressed by correspondents, whose letters are welcome, but for whose views we have no responsibility. Correspondents are requested to write in ink. It is essential that anonymous writers enclose their proper names as a guarantee of good faith. Unless this rule is complied with, their letters will not appear.

MONETARY REFORM (To the Editor) Sir.—My good friend Mr W. P. Kenah. in your issue of February 15. says that I advocated “the printing of £IOO.OOO in notes from the Reserve Bank for the purpose of buying foodstuffs for shipment to Spain.” Will Mr Kenah please prove that I advocated the printing of notes? It Js quite unnecessary to print notes; all that is required are the figures written in the appropriate account at the Reserve Bank. The trouble with Mr Kenah Is that he has not the foggiest notion of where the money comes from at present. If he did he would not display such lack of knowledge or set up weird fantasies that bear no relationship to fact. Douglas Credit can stand the sneers of the ignorant; the world will yet thank God for Douglas Credit. —I am, etc., R. G. YOUNG. Gordonton, February 15. THE NATIONAL PARTY (To the Editor) Sir.—As a constant reader of these columns I must confess myself disappointed with the weak attempts at propaganda indulged in by members of the National Party. There seems to be considerable room for improvement both in the standard of their contributions and in the co-ordination of their efforts. For example. Mr Kenah admits quite frankly that, like most Nationalists, he knows nothing about Social Credit. That fact, however, does not prevent him from trying to criticise it. I wonder what he would think if snm' 1 -. one without musical knowledge were to commence a criticism of Beethoven. Mr Adam Hamilton has given the compensating price his official blessing. and now we find Mr Kenah warning farmers that it is Douglas Credit in disguise. In a recent discussion another champion of the National Party, one ‘ Helpful.’* retired hastily in the face of some pointed criticisms, a fact which leads one to assume that the charges made were not without foundation. While “Helpful” was engaged in proving that the National Party was entirely “new,” Mr Hamilton was busily extolling the party for its deeds when in office. Now we read of Mr R. M. Algie condemning what he describes as ‘government by Order-in-Council," completely overlooking the fact that this method was introduced by the party he has undertaken to support. How can these Nationalists expect to be taken seriously?—l am, etc., PUZZLED. Hamilton, February 17. IMPORT RESTRICTIONS (To the Editor) Sir, —Amongst the many classes of goods that have been subject to the import restrictions have alcoholic liquors and the materials for making such been ineluded? At a time like the present the Government would be doing a good service to the country by banning this class of goods entirely. It must be quite evident to all who are at all interested in the wellbeing of their fellows that there is far too much drinking and drunkenness in New Zealand at the present, time. The Police Court news following Anniversary week-end made interesting reading, and the convictions recorded in the Auckland courts alone were a positive disgrace, and should make Aucklanders hang their heads with shame. And, again, the convictions of drunken motorists do not seem to be getting any fewer, notwithstanding the risk of imprisonment, and the number n't motor accidents (many fatal) that largely can be attributed to over-drinking is simply appalling. The Government seems to have put the curb on almost every other business by restricting hours'of work, but drink s'eems to have been left Mverely alone, to carry on as usual, and consequent on the workers, through Government regulation, having more leisure time and money to spend, the liquor trade is reaping a rich harvest, to the detriment of many workers and their families. If the Government of the day is realty sincere in its boasted interest in the workers of New Zealand, why does it not bring the open bar into line with other more essential businesses as regards Saturday closing, and thereby save the workers from their w’orst. enemy? The foregoing questions are being asked by many today.—l am, etc.,

W. ATKKVSON. Frankton Junction, February 17.

LABOURERS' UNION (To the Editor) Sir,—l would like to make a statement in support of Mr T. Mill*' letter In your paper of February it I an one of the many men to support the South Auckland Union, which we have not /rot at present. I would like to tell all the other trades union men that at a mass meeting which we held some months ago we had Mr Stanley here from Auckland to discuss things in general. When It came to question time I gave reasons why we should have a South Auckland Union, and I told Mr Stanley I was one of those men who formed the first General Labour Union in Christchurch in the early days. Mr Stanley 6aid I was out. of date. Should a union cnan talk like that? That is why the men in the South Auckland province want a union of their own. They want to run things on their own. without, dictatorship.—l am, etc., J. MOODY. Hamilton, February 15. WORK OF 100 YEARS (To the Editor Sir.—ln 10 40 New Zealand will have completed its first century of permanent occupation by the British. The pioneers of this Dominion, of whom few are now nlive, laid a wonderiul foundation, and on this foundation has been built the past anl present prosperity of the country. The men who first followed in the footsteps of the army which conquered ttie Waikato Maoris, and took up land there, were faced with the difficulty of subduing the fern which covered the whole country. There were no native grasses, such as tussock. which existed in Hawke's Bay and the South Island: all grass land had to be made, amt the cost of this, with low prices for cattle, sheep and wool, ruined all the pioneers. Others came after them and reaped the advantage of the pioneers’ past work; the freezing process of meat was introduced. the production and export of butter commenced, and thenceforward success was assured, on land which the pioneers had broken in and opened up by road and rail. The present rulers of this Dominion have taken the accumulated wealth of 100 years, golden eggs, in the lamd of the extinct moa, and are throwring and breaking them against the wall of Socialism. With what result only the future, time's avenger, can unfoldI am, etc., MOA. Hamilton, February 17. COMPENSATING PRICES (To the Editor) «ir,—There is no need for Mr Hunter to advise me to study the • literature’* on the subject of compensating prices. 1 am sufficiently familiar with it, and I will venture the assertion that no one. from Mr Hunter's schoolboy to Methuselah, could say what, precisely, the writers propose to do. I have expressed no opinion whatever on the question whether w*e ought or ought not to establish industries that require assistance from other forms of production. I have merely pointed out that we have auch industries, that we is a nation deliberately brought them into balng knowing perfectly well that they could not be maintained without assistance, and that we cannot escape our responsibilities to the industries that we ourselves have created. I repeat ttiat any policy that aims at forolng these industries into a position of equality with our primary industries, either by the remov.il of all duties or by the payment or th • same subsidies to both, is a policy of giving the same treatment to the strong and the weak, a policy that no one cun justify. This is entirely a matter of thm distribution of our output, because our output is the only thing we have to distribute—it is our sole source of income. To say that manufacturers require assistance is simply to eay that they, one way and another, use up more of our output than they replace with their own production. They oonsume more Income than they create. But if manufacturers consume more of our output than they create, then farmers must create more output than they consume. If one portion of our population consumes more income than it creates, some other portion must create more income than it consumes. That is the position from which there can be no escape by any policy whatever, so long as we have secondary industries and those industries involve us in loss. All talk of hearing that loss hut getting compensation for bearing it is 6imply nonsense.

Mr Hunter gives us the strange assertion—an assertion he supports with nothing—that while Ihe cost of anything given to manufacturers is passed on in entirety. Hie cost of anything given to farmers could not be passed on. A schoolboy, lie says, could devise ways of preventing anything of the kind. If help can be given lo farmers without charges that could be passed on. why not give manufacturers all lhe help they need without charges that could be passed on, and so remove the farmers' grievance and remove the need for compensation? How could it be easier in the one case than the other? Why not get h schoolboy to devise such a method of assisting cur manufacturers?—l aiu, etc., J. JOHNSTONE. Manure wa, February IC.