MORE WAR LEGISLATION

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 25, 24 October 1917, Page 4

MORE WAR LEGISLATION

Vmiy general approval will be extended to the principal provisions of the War Legislation Bill now before Parliament. It is particularly welcome on account of the marked increase in the powers it gives tho Government to deal with enemy aliens. The restrictions placed on enemy aliens and aliens generally in tho matter of local government affairs are obviously necessary, as are also the powers designed to prevent enemy aliens acquiring- land in the Dominion. The most important departure, however, and to many it will be deemed tho most essential, is the provision made for regulating, controlling, and enforcing the labour of enemy aliens. It has been for long a matter of adverse comment that enemy aliens resident in tho Dominion should have been permitted to enjoy so large a sharo of liberty to profit out of conditions arising out of the war. In the caso of interned enemy aliens they have been allowed to idle at tin; expense of the State, whereas their labour might have been directed into channels which would have been of public benefit. The authority which it is now proposed to give the Government will requiro to lie exercised with judgment and discretion, but the step now taken is undoubtedly one 111 the right direction. The Government is to be congratulated, 100, in its determination to ensure as far as possible

that the idlers in the community shall bo eliminated, and all available labour turned to the best account. Plainly Ministers arc waking up to the needs of national organisation in the interests of national efficiency. Some exception was taken in the House of .Representatives yesterday to the proposal to retain in tho public service and in the police force officers who have reached tho age at which under normal conditions they would retire on superannuation. Such objections as were raised appear puerile and unworthy o£ consideration when weighed against the conditions arising out ot the war and the issues at stake. Our young men are being called up lor military service, the ranks of the public services as well as the ranks of employees in all classes of private enterprise are being dopleted, and it is essential that every means possible should be adopted to fill tho gaps with tho labour available. It may be hard on the men who expected and were entitled under ordinary circumstances to retire to a well-earned leisure, and it necessarily must occasion disappointment to those under them y&o have looked forward to a step upward as the result of tho retirement of the older men. But what do these sacrifices amount to in comparison with the sacrifices tho men of military age are called on to make? Wo are too ready still to base our judgments on pre-war conditions and pre-war standards. We are also too ready, as a correspondent pointed out yesterday, to take too much for granted as to the progress of the war and to assume that because events are developing in our favour the necessity for pressing on with all our strength is less urgent than when tho prospect was less favourable. Nothing could be more dangerous tlum this short-sighted point ot view It is now that wo must steel ourselves for the supreme strugglo; it is now above all times that thero must be no sign of slackening effort or weakening! will. It is a matter for congratulation, therefore, that the Government should ho moving as it is doing in its latest war legislation, and it especially deserves the whole-hearted support of every class of the community in theeffort it is making to ensure that the availablo resources of the county shall be turned' to the best possible account.