RECOVERY OF N.S.W.

Press, Volume LXIX, Issue 20789, 24 February 1933, Page 4

RECOVERY OF N.S.W.

'PREMIER'S REVIEW. expansion, vnq^D. (THOU OUR OWM COaaISPQSfDBKT.) SYDNEY, February 16. A striking speech was made this week by the Premier of New South Wales (Mr B. S. B. Stevens), showing the tremendous change for £be better in the economic position for the State since June, 1932, when Mr Lang !"id his Labour followers went out of power. o"<3-third of the factory employees who had lost their jobs since the depression began, he said, had got them back again in recent months on a permanent basis. Eeturns showed an increase q£ more than 13 per cent, in the number of factory employees at tho end of 1932. In the metal trades the nunibfr increased from 8400 to 11,200 in 12 months, and there has been an increase of £6,C>n,ooo in the of retail shops. showed substantial increases in many other directions, and the most general index of business turnover—bank clearances—showed a rise of 10 per cent, since last February. Building permits for the four quarters of last year were 1J7,114,1?7 and 217 respectively, an<| for January this year the figures were more than half the total for the last quarter of 1932, The improvement was due to sound causes, such as a closer harniony between costs and prices; a reduction of taxation and charges; a removal of fear of the imposition of confiscatory taxation; greater velocity of spending due to a revival of private enterprise; a restoration of the sanctity of the contract and the security of investments; and tho continuance of favourahlo seasons. Of those things all but the last were possible only under an orderly, and business Government. They wore a triumph for sane democracy. Now the air was sweeter an.d cleardr and a sound basis? existed for business expansion. Even if export prices remained as they were there was every prospect of business expansion. Howover, export prices were bound to go tip, for the world was at. or near, a turning point towards general recovery. The Government's plans for credit oxpansion by means of capital development works were now welj advanced. The Government had the money with fvbich to commence very shortly to expand the rate of loan and unemployment relief expenditure, which had been oxtremely low for more than a year. The Premier concluded his speech with an appeal to everybody to "step out and expand on sound lines'' in'order to share m lAm improvement. "Do not tie up your funds and leave them idle,'' ho said, «<but put then, to produative use at rutoi which borrowers can' pav. Take som* risk if necessary, and von wjll find that the risk will prove In, than lhe .shocks of the W may have Jed you to expect, W'bave to keep abreast of the times and shako off tho depression psychology, To-day i 8 the day of the expansionist, and above all let us turn our backs on grumbling and fault-finding."

Nearly 00 statues in London are under the care of the Office of Works, and some half-dozen men find constant employment in looking after them*