"HOLIDAY PARALYSIS"
Sir,-Many of your readers will have felt the force of those criticisms levelled against New Zealand by Ian Stephens (editor of The Statesman of India). As a working man, however, I feel that "Holiday Paralysis’ bears some comment. Since the depression years the New Zealander has bent his mind towards a more communal and less despotic economy. He has deliberately voted’ in a government which by nationalising certain industries and taxing others has acted as a levelling agent on income and provided us with life’s basic securities. The reins of industry, however, are not shared; the worker, therefore, temains in a position where his ethical responsibilities are neither developed nor exercised in regard to the relation between his occupation and the world situation. Before the last Election there was much talk by the Opposition and its supporters of Profit Sharing, a system which, whatever its difficulties, could have developed into a type of joint ownership wherein the accent would naturally have moved from grossly materialistic considerations to an interest in the trade itself and further towards the obligation of an industry in the present world situation. Since the Election the idea has lapsed, although its inward worth should be patent to all industrialists of ood will. The final outcome of inertia on the part of the industrialists and of insufficient emphasis being placed on the moral responsibilities of freedom by the Labour Government, ‘is that we appear as a smug people deaf to the voice of compassion. On the other hand a reversion to longer hours and less holidays is no remedy since it would merely mean that we gave back to the industrialist both the profit and power, the inequalities of which we disapproved. Should our government propose any measure for the relief of stricken people we want to know that it is not a trap to cast us once again into the ethical and material which has its origins in unrestrained capitalism.
JOHN
SUMMERS
(Hororata).
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 16, Issue 401, 28 February 1947, Page 25
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329"HOLIDAY PARALYSIS" New Zealand Listener, Volume 16, Issue 401, 28 February 1947, Page 25
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