The Press Tuesday, August 12, 1924. The Duty on Sugar.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 18149, 12 August 1924, Page 8

The Press Tuesday, August 12, 1924. The Duty on Sugar.

Parliament will be required to deal very soon with the tariff on sugar. Last year a Customs Amendment Act was passed which provided, inter alia, that from September Ist, 1923, to September 30th, 1924, there should be a duty of five-sixteenths of a penny (a little over a farthing) on sugar. For several years, through an arrangement made between the Government and the Colonial Sugar Refining Co., New Zealand enjoyed a full supply of the best sugar at prices far below the prices charged in Australia. That the Government had mado a very good bargain everybody has recognised. Owing to the increase in the costs of production, the Colonial Sugar Company asked last year for the imposition of a duty, intimating plainly that unless the duty were impoaqd it would bo obliged to close down its refinery at Chelsea, Auckland. The matter was considered by the Industries Committee, which reported in favour of the duty, and the duty was imposed. This was not done, however, without a debate which ended in a division strictly on party lines—the Liberals and the Labour Party voting solidly against the duty. The purpose of the Opposition parties was merely the creating of prejudice against the Government, and the gaining for themselves of the credit <sf having attempted to save the public what would amount to less than sixpence per household per week. The Sugar Company, they declared, was "bluffing": it would not close down the Chelsea refinery and turn tho 400 employees adrift. It is never very easy in business matters to know when an individual or company is " bluffing," but the Industries Committee and the Government were satisfied that the .company would carry out its intention to abandon the refining business at Chelsea, because it was made plain enough that without the. duty there would be no inducement to the company to ca/ry on.. If the works at Chelsea, were to down, and sugar of all sorts were to be allowed free entry to the Dominion, there is no kind of assurance that the people would obtain the refined sugar at lower prices. The Sugar Company itfould be able to do profitable business if. the duty were maintained, but not-if the duty were removed; and it can find equally profitable markets elsewhere for its products. Faced with the certain prospect that #he removal of the duty would mean the shutting up of the Chelsea works, with no compensating advantage in respect of. the price and quality of future sugar supplies, the Government decided that the duty should be impo°e3. That this decision was disagroetible to it Mr Massey frankly admitted. "I do not like being coerced "into doing anything—l hate it as "mue'i as anyone in this House," ho saidj' "but we have to judge which "is the lesser of two evils." That is the question which Parliament will have"to deal with: which is the lesser of the two evils? In their anxiety to pose as "friends of the people" the Opposition last year overlooked the fact that what they proposed was the extinction of the sugar refining industry and the exposure to great uncertainty and difficulty of other industrr.es (confectionery manufacture and fruitpre nerving) without any certain, or, indeed, any calculable advantage of any kind. The suggestion was made in tho House last year that the duty is being imposed for the benefit of tho Sugar Company, but .docs anyone really believe that the Government would impose a duty for that purpose? The company will benefit, to be sure, by being able to continue a profitable refinery business, jnst as bootmakers profit through the duty on boots. But if the duty will also be for the benefit of the country—and it is solely because the Government believed it will have this result that it imposed the duty—it would be cutting off one's nose to spite one's face to remove it.

Two Kinds oS Treaties. It could have happened nowhere but in the British Empire that the Preamble to a Treaty with a foreign Power should have excited more comment thiyi the Treaty itself. In the Treaty just arranged with Bussia the King's name is not mentioned. For reasons that seem quite satisfactory, though they sound at first a little strange, the Foreign Office drew up .a-document binding Britain only, and not the British Empire. A Treaty Bigned by the King binds all the King's Dominions. A Treaty signed by the Foreign Office binds the Homeland. If it is intended that the Dominions also should be bound they also most sign, or in some other sufficient fashion explicitly adopt the agreement. But it has never been stated tSat the Treaty with Susaia is a political Treaty, of that it includes political clauses. It is a financial and commercial contract the clauses of which affect the Dominions (with the possible exception of Canada) only indirectly through their effect on the whole commercial world. There cannot be a trading impasse beteeea the Home-

land and Russia without the disturbance being felt both East and West, nor, contrariwise, can two such countries start trading again after a ten yeaTs' interruption without the vibration reaching the ends of the earth. But there is no other sense —if we accept political recognition as a long accomplished fact —in which this Treaty touches the Dominions, and no reason therefore why any Dominion should explicitly adopt it. On general principles it is desirable that the Dominions should be consulted by the Foreign Office before the conclusion of any agreements affecting the Fmpire in peac3 or war. We do not know whether they were consulted concerning Eussia, nor whether, if they were, consultation was more than formal. But it is ridiculous to ask, as the London "Daily Chronicle" does, "in what sense,the Empire can be said "to continue to exist if there is no "longer a common foreign policy." There never was "a common foreigc "Dolicy for the British Empire." There have been solemn declarations i that such a policy is desirable, and attempts, but no mere than attempts so f;ir, to give these declarations effect. The Dominions were consulted before Lausanne, they are reptesented to-day in London. They have membership in the League of Nations, they participated in the peace-making at Versailles. They were associated with the Imperial Government (through the Imperial "War Cabinet) in the conduct of the war, they were welcomed (with some misgiving) at Washington. But they have never at any time been in a state of continuous and effective consultation with the Foreign Office, and one of the biggest political problems of the day ia how to bring that about. The "Daily Chronicle" knows that arrangements are now under way for an Empire Conference to consider this very problem, and it-is not merely ungenerous—it" is mischievous and dishonest —to suggest that we are drifting from a safe ideal already established to something either reactionary or revolutionary. Mr Isitt on Labour. There were passages in Mr Isitt's onslaught on the Labour Party last week with which we do not agree. There were some things that could have been left unsaid, and some said that are not a good reason, or a good example, against extremism. But Mr Isitt delivered some blows that go home. It is a fact that the policy of the Labour Party seeks to undermine the foundation upon which many besides Mr Isitt rest their hopes for the future of the Empire, and for the future of the Dominion and its people. We do not attach much importance to Labour's attempt to saddle the other two parties with the responsibility for all the financial stress and difficulty and trouble that exists, since the number of electors guileless enough to be caught by tshaff of that kind must be small. But it is a serious thought that this trouble, which everyone knows to be a war legacy, means no more to the Labour Party than a situation to be exploited politically. It is not what the Labour Party says about this financial stress which matters, nor what it thinks about it: what matters is that it works so hard to perpetuate it. It will not have economy, unless in other sections of the community, and it will not accelerate production because that puts profits in someone else's pockets. No country has been so successful as our own in meeting the consequences of the war, but the success gained has been in spite of, and not with the assistance of, the Labour Party. Its partly selfish, partly ignorant, and wholly irresponsible attitude to the public purse has been the biggest obstacle, after the Liberal Party, to good government and careful financial administration. While we do not doubt that Ijabour in office would be less irresponsible than Labour howling in the wilderness, Labour can get into office only by promising the moon to the multitude, and in office it would have to supply something. Mr Isitt spoke also of the demoralisation caused by go-slow, and by the pernicious doctrine that employers are criminals who live by robbing their workmen. When he went on to attribute the enormous increase in dishonesty to this vicious teaching he went too far, if by dishonesty he meant the kind of dishonesty that places men in courts of justice. But no one doubts that it is demoralising to the community in the broad sense to encourage idleness, suspicion, and social enmity.