BUDGET ATTACK.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 269, 13 November 1935, Page 11

BUDGET ATTACK.

"BELATED PROMISES."

QUESTIONS ABOUT GOLD.

DEMOCRAT LEADER'S TOUR.

(By Telegraph.—Press Association.)

HAW ERA, this day.

His first election address in Taranaki was given by Mr. T. C. A. Hislop, Democrat party leader, to a crowd of 1200 which packed the Opera House last night. Mr. Hislop was given an attentive hearing and his address was punctuated by frequent bursts of applause. Mr. Hislop said that Mr. Coates had either overspent or overtaxed when his job was to balance income and expenditure and reduce taxation. Accordingly in his last Budget he at first allowed £200,000 for supplementary estimates, leaving a surplus of £13,500, but in the dying hours of the session made extra grants bringing the amount to £048,487, so that he was £400,000 down before the year started. The Democrat policy had been criticised as touting for votes. "I leave it to you," said Mr. Hislop, "to decide the significance of tlie Government's lastminute promises. Those promises are not going to fool the people." Acquisition of Gold. Attacking the statement made by Mr. Coates regarding the compulsory acquisition of the banks' gold, Mr. Hislop challenged Mr. Coates to answer three questions: (1) Did tho Government of Canada, or of any other country, pay for gold taken in notes of a currency which that Government had already depreciated by political pressure? . (2) Was it not a fact that in every other country gold taken from the banks, with its attendant profit, was handed to the central bank as security for the banks' obligations to the public and their depositors, instead of being used in a large measure, as had been done by Mr. Coates, to balance the Budget and (3) as a result of Mr. Coates' operations what would the value of a Reserve Bank note be should England revert to the gold standard, which might occur at any time ?/ The last question was not an academic one. and the entire community, and local bodies who had loans and interest to pay in London, were entitled to an answer. Answering a question whether the New Zealand Legion was behind the Democrat party, Mr. Hislop said the Democrats were apart from any other organisation. If tho legion supported them they were glad of it. The legion had done much good in creating a spirit of idealism.