A GENEROUS PROPOSAL

Evening Post, Volume XCVI, Issue 21, 24 July 1918, Page 6

A GENEROUS PROPOSAL

Mr. E. Newman, M.P., himself a woolgrower, made at Marton on Saturday a proposal as novel as it was generous. It was that certain profits arising out of the sale of wool to the 1 Imperial Government should be devoted to a fund for benefiting dependents of those who have been wounded or have lost their lives while serving in the Royal Navy and British mercanSle marine during the war. As a wool-grower Mr. Newman realised that the "Mother Country has treated the Dominion very liberally since the war, both in regard to prices and in providing shipping." His suggestion is a practical expression of gratitude for that treatment. The Imperial Government is not only paying 55 per cent, over the prices wool-growers received at the New Zealand wool sales in 1913-1914, but it is proposed that in, future profits made on the sale of wool for civilian purposes —army and navy requirements being first satisfied—shall be shared equally with the wool-growers. It is this SO per cent, of the profits to be derived from the sale of surplus wool that it is suggested should be dealt with as Mr. Newman, proposes.

The Marion Farmers' Union adopted th» idea and forwarded it for consideration of the wool-growers of the Dominion as a whole It is for the producer to accept or reject it; but Mr. Newman strikes tlia rigktl note when he acknowUdgss ths doU ot ail lumen, wool-

growers, and, in short, the people of the Dominion as a whole, to the Soyal Navy and to the mercantile marine, which in this war must be considered as one sea force. Wonderful work has been done, glox'ious deeds have been achieved by the men in both branches. Further, no ship has ever been held up because men were deterred from sailing in her for fear of the diabolical piracy of the Germans. But for these men neither Mr. Newman, nor any other New Zealand producer would have been in a position to make such a proposal. They would have had only the narrow limits of the local market to work in, and certainly no money to give away. The spirit prompting Mr. Newman deserves to.be warmly commended.