Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. THURSDAY, JANUARY 16, 1930. NO, LABOUR PANACEA.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 50, Issue 81, 16 January 1930, Page 4

Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. THURSDAY, JANUARY 16, 1930. NO, LABOUR PANACEA.

Those who imagined that the advent o.t a Labour Government in Great Britain was going- to solve all social problems aie probablv very‘busy revising- their ideas. Actually the Labour Government has changed very little. It possesses no magic vvancl, no monopoly of brains or administrative ability or goodwill, and, like any other Government, finance sets a limit to its programme. The chief reason why Mr Ramsay MacDonald was returned to office was because he and his party claimed they could solve the unemployment problem. The British electors have given them a chance to do so. But so far there has been practically no reduction in the number of unemployed,' despite the lavish outpouring of money for public works and the excursions abroad in search of markets of Messrs Snowden and Thomas. According to the official returns there were in Britain on December 30 last a total of 1,510,20 unemployed, an increase in 14 days of 206,043. The large increase is to be explained by seasonal slackness after the busy weeks before 1 ' Christmas. Nevertheless, as compared with the figures on December 30, 1928, w hen the Baldwin Government was in office, the decrease in employed is only 10,530. After all its extravagant promises that is the utmost the Labour Government has been able to accomplish, although heavy additions have been made to national expenditure. The only way to pay for these new items will be by taxes on industry and commerce, which are already overburdened. The direct result will be further to depress. British trade and industry and so add to the unemployment which it is proposed to cure. Moreover, the Labour Government is extending* the system ol doles to include boys and girls of 15 who cannot find fobs. Dole is the correct term in this case, because these children have never made any contribution to the insurance funds!. It is a terrible confession of failure by tbe Government to admit youths in their “teens” as State pensioners. Just when the spur of necessity wouldbe most salutary, fust when boys should be showing initiative, resource, and determination to improve themselves, they are presented witli a dole which they may draw indefinitely so long as they live in idleness. They are no longer required to prove they have sought work; the onus is on the labour bureaux to prove they have not. Even under this one head, the Labour Government, has failed lamentably to deliver the goods. It must be a sore disappointment to those who expected Labour to build “a new Heaven and a ned earth.” There is some hope that something more positive may follow from Mr Thomas’s scheme of financial assistance to industry drawn up in collaboration with .City of London financiers; but no hope that Socialism will achieve anything at all.