STRIKING ITALIAN REPORT

Evening Post, Volume C, Issue 87, 9 October 1920, Page 5

STRIKING ITALIAN REPORT

"HELP THESE SIMPLE PEOPLE 1'

(AUSTRALIAN - NEW ZEALAND CABLE ASSOCIATION.)

(BESLISHED IN THE HUES.) (Received October 9, 9 a.m.)

ROME, 7th October.

A report of Socialist leaders who have returned from a visit to Russia, describing the results of Bolshevism, says the peasants have derived more advantages than damage from the revolution. On the other hand, the life of workmen lias become worse, andi the citie3 have fallen into material misery. The Government is incapable of supplying even a minimum of indispensible necessities. Speculation is rampant, and all industrial and commercial organisation has been destroyed. Bureaucracy has enormously increased. It is usele&s to cherish illusions as to exports, as all transport is disorganised. The Communists number only 600,000 out of a population of sixty millions; but they are masters of the political and economic machine. The practical results have not answered the -ideal promises regarding the revolution. The capitalist regime has been destroyed, but nothing has been substituted. The report concludes: "In the name of humanity, all must help these simple people to emerge from such a miserable situation and recognise the fallacy of their simple conception of life." The report is the more significant because it is signed by Labourites, who were originally sympathisers with Bolshevism.