"QUIET OPTIMISM."

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 57, 7 March 1936, Page 7

"QUIET OPTIMISM."

NEW ZEALAND TO-DAY.

MOTOR HEAD'S IMPRESSIONS.

A CURE FOR UNEMPLOYMENT,

A general spirit of confidence and quiet optimism in business circles in New Zealand and Australia has impressed Mr. Li. J. Hartnett, regional director of General Motors for the two countries, who passed through Auckland to-day on the Mariposa on his way from Sydney to San Francisco. Mr. Hartnett stressed the value of the expansion of secondary industries as a lasting cure for unemployment.

"It has been most encouraging to receive such satisfactory reports of the progress made in the Dominion during tiie past year," said Mr. Hartnett. "Business activity in Australia is so closely linked with that in the Dominion that the position and of the one country are of the utmost importance to the other. A few hours spent in any of the principal cities of New Zealand are enough to convince any intelligent observer of the general spirit of confidence and quiet optimism which prevails—a remarkable change from the position of a year or two ago."

In Australia, too, confidence was returning to industry, commodity prices were rising, and much more money was changing hands than was the case a year or so ago. During the year secondary industries in general had expanded considerably and lie had been greatly struck by the advance made by the motor industry in both countries. The number of new vehicles registered in Melbourne during the last month of 1935 had been nearly 70 per cent greater than the figure for December, 1934. In recent years, both in the Dominion and in the Commonwealth, the motor industry, with its assembly plants, bodybuilding factories and glass and upholstery works, had come to the forefront among secondary industries, and was directly responsible for a substantial contribution towards the wealth and revenue of the two countries. Of this fact the industry was proud.

"We want to see what everyone else wants to see —a rise in the general price level, together with a rise in incomes," said Mr. Hartnett. "We want to see the purchasing power of the public increased. This is a big question, quite beyond the control of the ordinary trading concern.

"It is specially pleasing to see that the development of the secondary industries of the Dominion is a major matter in the new Government's programme," he added. "After all, it is the secondary industries of a country that are the greatest potential employers of labour, and in the expansion of these industries lies the most lasting cure for unemployment. creating a better condition of balanced economy."