Customs and the Wage-earner.

Press, Volume LIX, Issue 17807, 5 July 1923, Page 8

Customs and the Wage-earner.

From such of their criticisms as we have seen, the opponents of the Government have not found easy their task of finding fault with the Budget. Their difficulty may bo imagined from the fact that they are driven into seeking for matter for complaint in sbe Prime Minister's estimate that Customs duties will yield about a million more than in 1922-23. Here, they sajv is conclusive evidence of the harshness of the Government towards the poor wage-earner. Now, the truth is that the burden upon the wage-earner, in the sense in which the Liberals mean that phrase to be understood, is smaller here than in almost any country in th© world. If he insists upon using whisky and tobacco, the wage-earner can scarcely complain that the duty collected from him 'by th© Government in respect of these articles is bread taken, out of his mouth. These duties cannot be complained of as cruel imposts on the necessaries of life. The wageearner does, to be sure, pay duty on imported clothing and other things which are necessary, but is it not a fact that the imposition of these duties is supported by the workers as a means of '''protecting" them against cneap foreign labour? It is absurd to talk of the Customs duties as a cruel levy upon the toiler. But what, it may be asked, is to be eaid of the Prime Minister's expectation that an extra million vail be collected by the Customs Department this year? The answer is this: that if the consumer does not consume a larger amount of Imported material ho will not pay any larger amount of duty. The increased revenue from, the Customs will be the result of increased consumption. During "Ehe first five months of this year the imports exceeded the imports for the first five months of 1922 by 4 millions sterling, and for the whole of the year, no doubt, the increase will be greater than that. It is eurely time that the Liberals gave up talking nonsense about the heavy burden which Customs taxation lays upon the poor.