AUSTRALIAN BUDGET DEBATE

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 7, 3 October 1941, Page 8

AUSTRALIAN BUDGET DEBATE

Mr. Fadden’s Vigorous Reply

WAGE-EARNERS’ POSITION (By Telegraph. —Press Assn. Copyright.) (Received October 3, 12.40 a.m.) CANBERRA, October 2. Rising amid ministerial cheers to repel the Labour attack on the Budget Bill, the Prime Minister, Mr. I’aciden, in the House of Representatives today quickly swung into the counteroffensive, in the course of which he expressed the keenest disappointment at Mr. Curtin’s speech, which he declared merely offered jninor ciiticism and little in the way of constructive suggestions. expected liim to make a iudua* mental contribution to the method of developing the war effort, but again I have been disappointed, he said. “I remind the Labour Party that never before has the wage-earner had more work,;better pay, a higher standard of living and better social conditions and never has private enterpiise been so rigidly controlled in ihe public interest.” • Mr Fadden proceeded to defend the Budget, and he said the Government had made great exactions on the higher incomes, leaving the lower incomes better off than before the war. Taking of 20 tier cent, of the natural wealth of Australia for waging the war was not a pleasant task but it was an inescapable necessity. Mr. Fadden challenged Mr. Curtin to deny that wholesale and retail prices in Australia at present were the lowest of any country in the world, New Zealand included. He pointed out that to exempt lower incomes from taxation would depreciate the Budget position by £15,000,000. The Government, he added, was not prepared to recast the Budget, because nothing Mr. Curtin had said would improve it, and he as Treasurer would not be a party to a worse Budget. The Minister of Air, Mr. McEwen, made it clear that if the Government is defeated Mr. Fadden will recommend a dissolution and election.

NATIONAL CREDIT

Canberra Opposition’s Policy CANBERRA, October 1. Mr. J. Curtin, in his speech on the Budget, said that the fighting men had first claim upon the country, and that their families had first right to any special privileges which the country could afford in time of war. Labour, indeed, had a fundamental objection to the Budget, because it proposed that national credit should be created by the Commonwealth Bank in such a way that a third party would be permitted to make a profit.

Labour submitted that there was nothing in respect of the national credit which required doing which the Commonwealth Bank itself was not entirely competent to do.