THE SMALL MAN'S WAR BILL.

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2564, 11 September 1915, Page 12

THE SMALL MAN'S WAR BILL.

Sir, —In reference to "A Popular Tax" in your issue of August 23. your scribe seems to think tho single man 1 and all bachelors should be taxed one shilling .in the £. 1 think if your scribe looks at it in the right light, it is those small wage-earners who aro nlieady paying a substantial tax in tho present cost of living. When everything went up to its highest your presont Government did not suggest to raise tho wages to compete with tho rise ill foodstuffs, especially the unnecessary rise in the price of butter, for it is a well-known fact our soldiers at the front or in tho trenches are not consuming it, and all t-hoso thousands oi men were consuming butter before the war started, and therefore I cannot see how the war was tho cause of tho rise in tho price of butter. Therefore, it is the £2 10s. per week man who is already paying a (heavy tax. It is tho working man that has to pay overy time. The man that gets 9s. or 10s. per day only averages four days per week all the year round, taking the weather and timo off into consideration, and look at what he has to pay for board at the present time—from £1 up to £2 par week. That is the real oauso of so many bachelors. They don't get a living wago to marry on. Take house rents in Palmerston North, four or five-roomed house and not "flash"'at that, £1 per week rent, and Bome that I know are paying 225, 6d. |)er week. So when'you pay your rent and your store bill, your milkman's bill, and your gas bili, and not to speak of other small accounts, and only get in three days in, the week through wet weather, I am afraid there is not much left for the war tax collector. 'The producer benefits every time, and the poor consumer has to pay fclie penalty. If your scribe has got any senso it is the working man and the poor man that is .playing the biggest part in this great war. They are like the widow that cast in her two mites— all that she had. Our Lord said she had given more than any of them. So they are giving more than any of them—they are giving their lives as well as all they have got. You speak of shirkers. If your Government doesn't treat her soldiers better there will bo more shirkors. Here in -Palmerston the other day L met one of our wounded soldiers,, still suffering from his wounds, and ho had not got one shilling in his pocket, not what would pay for his breakfast. I asked him if lii's pay continued while he was on sick leave, and lie told me that he only got £1 per week from the Governmentnow, and he said that it hardly got him tucker, not to speak of shelter, and t ask where can a man get board for one pound per week ? So it's Sard and cruel to see a man come back from -die front lrth 110 home to go - to, and only allowed £1 per week to keep, himself and get about on, and still under doctor's care. It is awful to think of it. A man almost forced to beg for a living. Then they ask .how it is that there are so many shirkers. When they see a fine stamp of man treated like this it frightens others; thoy thick they are under Gorman rule already. Go into any of tho common boardinghouses in Palmerston North and see what you have to pay for a bed and breakfast—2s. for beel and Is. 6d. for breakfast), so you can see how a man with ono pound per week can pay his way and get_ about. It also like tho last' clause in your Pensions Bill, whero it Bays a nonresident of' New Zealand won't get a pension. Now, there aro hundreds of young men gone to tho front from liore that belong to the Old Country, and have their dependants there. It is quito natural if those young men come hack disabled for .hfo that. they, will rather go home to'bo looked after by their own people. Well, if thoy loav'o New Zealand they don't get any pension. I say it is not right. If a man has fought and got disabled ho should have_ tho option cf drawing tho samo pension in the Old Country as well as in New Zealand, and your 355. pe 1 ? Week pension here would not pay for his board and an attendant to look after hiin. Naturally he should have tho option of going Home to his own people to look after him. 'And I think if your scribe on "A Popular Tax" looks ;into details ho will say with mo the £2 10s. per week man is. paying tho war tax already .--I am, etc.,

[Men who have relumed from -tho front either sick or 'ivounded receivo from the date of their arrival in Now Zealand their full rate of pay according to their rank, a private receiving ss. per day, and so on. While on 'the field a soldier of course only receives a .portion of liis pay, but immediately upon lii&_ returning to New Zealand lie is entitled to the full rato.of pay. There may be oases .where men are living at an address'unknown-to'the Pay Office, when -of course their pay cannot be forwarded. On application, however, their money.-can bo had immediately.]