DOMINION TOPICS

Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 122, 16 February 1935, Page 20

DOMINION TOPICS

Deserving Cases. Mr. Coates says that only the deserving ones are to obtain assistance, but even a deserving case may be a hopeless one. The intention is said to be to make a present to these of 20 per cent, equity, which means that fourfifths of the ownership would be the mortgagee’s, in other words on a £5OOO property Interest would be paid on £4OOO. How can a man recover under such circumstances, when even a small measure of success depends on ability to purchase manures and other farm requirements that the property may earn sufficient to pay the financier who owns 80 per cent, of it? The proposals do not sound sensible to us, and we suspect that, as with the increase in exchange, the chief benefit will go to others than farmers.—“ Southland Daily News.” Two Points of View.

Parliament and a large section of the public are too prone to see only the borrower’s point of view and to set about helping him in a way that often ends in harming him. The risk of so doing with this bill should be plain. If the lending margin is widened, or the bond issuing limit is stretched too far—to take two provisions already considered —the investing public may fail to take up either shares or bonds; or the subscription of the former may flag and the interest rate on the latter be higher than that hoped for. Thus politlcans who pose as the good friend of the mortgagor may prove his worst enemy. Hence a careful eye should be kept for the Investor or mortgagee. If his interest is safeguarded, so will be that of the mortgagor. The lender’s interest must be as carefully preserved as the borrower’s, even if only on the latter’s account.—“N.Z. Herald.” . Air Terminals.

When the Transport Co-ordination Board talks of a Palmerston NorthDunedin air service as a trunk system for .the Dominion, it merely repeats words which were put into its mouth by the applicants for a license to fly over this route. The service would link the two Islands and would meet the needs of the South to a moderate extent, but would do no more. It is farcical to suggest that a service which omitted the two main cities, and failed to come within a hundred miles of the most important province, ■would be a trunk line. The applicants for this particular license may have had their reasons for proposing such a route, but the Board, as the authority entrusted with powers to serve the interests of the Dominion as a whole, is lacking in imagination if it allows a Dominion airway system to be tied down and shackled at the start in this way. The natural line is from Auckland to Invercargill, with calls at the principal towns and cities along the' route.— "Auckland Star.” Mortgage Finance.

The Chambers of Commerce and other business groups brand these proposals as unnecessary, unsound and dangerous. They agree that there is need for a scheme to rehabilitate farmers’ finance, but say it is possible to evolve a scheme for the final adjustment of existing mortgages without creating the National Mortgage Corporation urged by the Minister of Finance. The alternative proposals of the committee are clearly stated in the report now published, aud will repay close attention. We hold that the verdict must go against Mr. Coates. There are aspects of the case, Of course, on which many will disagree with both parties to the argument. . The committee says, for instance, that it does not believe the Mortgage Corporation would be able, permanently, to stabilise mortgage interest rates at a low figure. It is a fact, however, that the State Advances Department did stabilise interest rates for a very long time, so there is no reason why rates should not be stabilised again, even for a period of twenty years or more.— Christchurch “Star.” Native Land Settlement. The Government’s decision to continue the development work inaugurated by Sir Apirana Ngata is proof that it was not ill-devised, and that the errors that led to the ex-Minister’s resignation were in regard to carelessness of administration rather than unsoundness of principle. Evidently the Prime Minister sees no difficulty about exercising proper supervision, and the prevention of any exploitation by individuals of funds provided by the State for tlie benefit of the Maori people as a whole. Mr. Forbes has made no reference to tlie vexed question of the conditions under which the Maori settlements will be carried on when the production stage has been reached. Will the holdings be held by individuals having a title to the laud they occupy, just as in the cast of a pukeha settler, or is the land to be held communally? Then there is the question of ownership and responsibility for livestock and other farm equipment. These are questions raised by the Royal Commission, and they still demand replies, for upon the answers to those problems, aud the Maori reaction to those answers, will depend the success or failure of the land development plans.—“Taranaki Daily News." The State of tlie Roads.

The motorists are paying such heavy taxation, particularly on petrol, that they are entitled to complain about the condition of the highways they are compelled to use. and when it ..is remembered that the condition of these roads is reflected in the costs which all transport within the province has to bear, the neglect to construct and maintain modern highways is a false economy, and that while farmers may applaud the fact that they are being saved something in rates, they are actually losing a considerable amount, not only through their own motor-cars-, but through the transportation of the products of their farms, and through the goods which they must buy in the Cities. To-day the province of Southland is suffering, not merely in connection with its tourist traffic, but in connection with its ordinary commercial communications, because its roads are in a bad state. And a groat part of this loss, let it he remembered, is being borne by the farmers who perhaps do not realise the extent of their burden because it does not come, tothem in the form of direct charges. It is really time something was done.— “southland Times.”

Bankrupt Farmers. The Minister of Finance recently made a statement to the effect that 50,000 farmers were really bankrupt. The Associated Chambers of Commerce was quick to challenge the accuracy of such figures, and it has since obtained from the Associated Banks a statement that the number of farmers having bank accounts either overdrawn or in credit on January 28, 1935, was •45,518. Of these, 3039, or 6.26 per cent, of the total, were in serious financial difficulties. These figures account for at least half the farmers in the Dominion, and there cannot be any reason to suspect that practically all the rest are bankrupt, which would have to be presumed if Mr. Coates’s estimate were accepted as correct.—Christchurch “Sun.” The Mills of Taxation. It is only the gold export duty that has in the current year produced a lower revenue than was yielded in the nine months of 1933-4. The Customs revenue, the sales tax, the highways revenue and the stamp and death duties have all brought in a great deal more than in the comparative period of the preceding year, and, while it is in the present quarter that income tax payments fall due, the very considerable increase in the payments made in the nine months suggests a likelihood that the total receipts from this source for the complete year will show an appreciable expansion.' The taxpayer really seems to merit congratulation on the fact that, besides contributing four millions more or less to the Unemployment Fund, he is able to provide the Consolidated Fund with a revenue that would have been regarded as decidedly handsome in prosperous times in the Dominion, when the national Income was much larger than it now is.— “Otago Daily Times.” “Seeing Tilings.”

When Hood and Moncrieff were lost on their Tasman flight attempt reports came from widely separated places that the plane had been heard. Only a few months ago an alarm was raised by the reported fall of an aeroplane into the sea off Okato. No doubt the observers are genuine in their belief, but the eye, is. not always a faithful recorder, and the brain has an extraordinary capacity to believe what it likes. It is well known that many children are given to enlarging on things they see, or even do not .see, spinning such a good tale that they eventually convince themselves that they actually experienced what never happened. The doctor at Taupo was very wise to believe that what he saw might have been an aeroplane, and to raise an alarm that meant, checking up the planes in the district. As it happened, he was mistaken. Many things unaccounted for have been seen in New Zealand, but we have yet to encounter a Loch Ness monster.— “Taranaki Herald.” The Crucial Test.

The fact that the Government is universally looked to fur the alleviation of hardships and wrongs caused by the depression, may be claimed to entitle it to act with a view to translating the implied responsibility into actual practice. In this respect the Bill is somewhat a compromise, for it falls midway between the two divisions of opinion in Parliament which advocate either complete State dominance or private enterprise. As a compromise it may fail to give satisfaction to- either school of thought, but it need not, on that account, be prevented from operating successfully. If the Corporation is to be' a success it must appeal to investors as a financially sound proposition, and the modifications which have been made go a long way towards establishing it with confidence on the investment market. Given the strong public support to which, on the face of it, it appears most certainly to be entitled, the Corporation should prove a beneficial and permanent institution.—“Waikato Times.” Meat Export.

While the British manufacturer fulminates against the trade-strangling policies of foreign countries, particularly high Customs duties, quotas, embargoes, and exchange manipulation and restriction, the British Miuistry of Agriculture is indulging in a little of each of the two first-mentioned devices to protect the British stock-breeder and fa ttener,. whose bonus of 5/- per live cwt. presumably terminates on March 31. There is to be a levy of Id. per lb. on “foreign” meat (which practically means Argentine chilled beef) and Jd. per lb. on Empire meat (mostly New Zealand frozen lamb and mutton and Australian frozen and chilled beef, though New Zealand also exports some beef and Australia some mutton and lamb, and both export some pork). The use of the word “quota" is adroitly avoided, though the principle is insidiously retained, under cover of the insinuating phrase “slight quantitative control or restriction.” This “longterm” policy is a compromise, which may appease all parties for the time being or for the eighteen months' trial it is being given.—“ Dunedin Star.” Motorists and the Law.

The suggestion made by a Hawera solicitor that motorists charged with breaches of the Motor Vehicles Act oi of local by-laws should be able to have their evidence taken on commission has been made several times by lawyers in the last few years and deserves serious consideration. In a day’s drive a man may pass through 20 or 30 different local jurisdictions and risk breaking any one of some hundreds of by-laws. Unfortunately neither common sense nor careful driving is an adequate guarantee that he will not transgress. There is always a chance that, because he has driven at more than 12 miles an hour in a deserted street or failed to park at the angle prescribed by a town board, he will be summoned to appear in a court a hundred miles or more from his place of domicile. Even if he believes himself innocent of the offence alleged against him. and believes that he Can prove his innocence, he will probably consider it cheaper to plead guilty It is probable that provision for the taking of evidence on commission would effect some Improvement. — “The Press,” Christchurch.