FOOD TAXES.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 9299, 29 July 1901, Page 4

FOOD TAXES.

The new German tariff imposes an import tax of 5s 6d per 2201b of wheat, and 5s upon a similar weight of rye or oats. Allowing for slight waste during the conversion of grain into flour, the tax will work out roughly at the rate of a penny upon every three pounds of flour. Assuming that a hundred pounds of flour will make a hundred and thirty pounds of bread, the new impost will mean an increase of a halfpenny upon every two-pound loaf. The tendency of the tax will be to stimulate the local production of wheat and assist in providing freight to be carried upon the new canal system which the Kaiser has set his heart upon. On the other hand it will cheek the shipping industry to the extent to which it checks imports, and it must certainly play into the hands of those organising the great industrial upheaval which has already commenced upon the Continent of Europe. The tax was imposed to propitiate the Agrarians, and to bribe them to cease opposition to the Emperor's two gr&it designs—the creation of a powerful navy and the construction of a network of waterways. The latter scheme is eminently statesmanlike, but it was bitterly opposed by the Junker, or squirearchy, section of the people. They apparently hope to see the cost of carrying out these works, and of adding to the navy, passed on to those with whom bread really is the staff of life. But the days when this sort of. thing could be achieved by means of an Act of Parliament have passed away. For a time the workers will have to submit to the injustice of a tax upon their food to pay for schemes which add to the value of landowners' possessions and the crops they raise on them, but in the end the right horse will be saddled. There is manhood suffrage in Germany, and although at present there is not that organisation which is necessary to success, matters in this respect are fast changing. If the workers of that couptry, in spite of their growing intelligence, co&v inue .to believe in Protec 1 !! Wj 1 policy, tnt>J will ultimately get back on the Junkei's" ,by means of heavier duties upon all imported manufactures.