NOTES OF THE DAY

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 110, 3 February 1931, Page 8

NOTES OF THE DAY

Yesterday was published a photograph of a motor-lorry load of 46 bales of wool which were transported from Kaikoura to Christchurch for 5/- a bale./ The cost by rail from Parnassus to Christchurch, a journey about 30 or 40 miles shorter, would have been 8/3 a bale. What chance has the South Island Main Trunk line, which is being pushed on from Parnasstis to Kaikoura, of competing against these motor freights which, no doubt, present the additional advantage of lifting the wool from the shearing shed? Incidentally 46 bales is no mean load and shows that the existing road can stand up to the traffic. Experts have already suggested that the road, improved if necessary, can give all the goods and passenger service that the district ever seems likely to require and at a great saving in capital and annual costs. In view of these circumstances and the urgent need to reduce State expenditure, the Government .would do well to review the question of completing thefSouth Island Main Trimk railway. * * * •

Many local bodies are likely to have trouble in collecting rates this year. According to report owners of small homes and farms will be particularly hard pressed to find a lump sum in these stringent times. Would it not be worth while in future, therefore, for. local bodies to encourage ratepayers to pay by instalments? The majority oi people are notoriously improvident, they are always falling short of their resolutions to “put by” to meet this or that obligation, and it is hard to meet what to them is a large Sum out of current income. It was to allow for this human frailty of improvidence that the-instal-ment system of retail buying was invented and it certainly has enabled many people to acquire things they would never have possessed if they had-been required to pay cash down. Local bodies may argue that it is always open to ratepayers to discharge their dues by instalments but that is to show ignorance of the procrastination that is part of all of us. If instead they encouraged ratepayers to pay monthly, like the rent, the annual wrench and difficulty of collection would be avoided and they would save much interest on overdraft.

There are some people who -are always cheerfully ready to put it on to-the other fellow. In New Zealand to-day, for instance, there is a growing recognition of the fact that there can be no true solution of our problems without an all-round reduction in costs. The trouble is that so many are prepared blithely to ignore the condition that the reduction must be “all-round” or universal, that all must take less. Labour politicians want to preserve wage standards and say that the rate of interest should come" down. The farmers want cheaper money, cheaper labour and lower taxation. And so it goes on. But there is a tendency among all other classes to “pick on” the civil service, to single it out as the group that should first suffer the cut. This is not fair and, even if it were, would not go deep enough. If the Government is contemplating reducing the salaries of its own servants, it should also empower the Arbitration Court to proceed similarly with another large class of sheltered workers. There will be justifiable resentment if fish is made of some and. fowl of othets; but if all are treated alike, if we are all called upon to make'monetary sacrifices, the necessity, although distasteful, will be accepted less bitterly.

In a review of the economic situation as published to-day, Sir Harold Beauchamp has rightly placed emphasis on the financial problems with which farmers are faced and the duty of all those concerned with their welfare to see that they are helped past tight place in which they find themselves. There is reason to believe, as Sir Harold says, that many mortgagees have met or are willing to meet mortgagors in a reasonable spirit and to make considerable concessions to enable the farmers to carry on. That is as it should be and it may be hoped that such voluntary agreements will be generally made so that there will be no need for State intervention. Legislative enactments of this kind are usually harmful to the credit structure and are always hard to lift. In Taranaki what has been called an “ttmpite committee” has been set up to compose disputes and, if it proves that mortgagees and mortgagors are disposed to enter the committee’s orbit, a more general application of the idea should prove useful. Sir Harold Beauchamp makes the suggestion that, if mortgagees are willing to make concessions, it would surely be in accord with the principle of “equality of sacrifice” that the Government ■ should abate its tax demands. Straitened national finances will not make it easy to adopt Ais idea, but it is jieyertbelesfi a £air auggastioa, ,