AN INVESTIGATION

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 115, 18 May 1927, Page 10

AN INVESTIGATION

UNSOUND LEGISLATION

BLAMED

(By Telegraph.)

(Special to "The Evening Post")

AUCKLAND, This Day. The report of the special committee of the Auckland Chamber o£ Commerce set up to investigate unemployment summarises its conclusions as follow: That the increasing rate of unemployment in the Dominion was mainly due to unsound social, industrial, and fiscal legislation, for the placing of which upon the Statute Book all political parties alike must accept responsibilityThat unemployment with ever-increas-ing severity might be expected to recur until such legislation was reconsidered in the direction of restoring freedom of contract in the marketing of produce and the offering or acceptance of employment subject to reasonable safeguards for the health, safety, and well-being of the wage-earner. That unemployment was intensified by the present high rate of taxation. That there was need for a longer range planning of public works: The Government could 'establish closer tonch with municipalities and other local bodies with a view to the registration of any projected schemes of improvement work, such as road, rail, and tram extensions, civic improvements, and other projects of a public character. After .. registration such schemes could in emergencies of unemployment be expedited in order of urgency, so that the amount of employment available might be adjusted to the amount of labour offering (unentployables exeepted), always bearing in mind that the prosecution of any public works of an unproductive character likely to constitute a burden upon the public funds should be avoided. The provision of "relief works" in the ordinary sense of the term was a thriftless expedient, expensive to the State and demoralising to the recipient, and "was in no sense a remedy. That there was need for a more car«iful regulation of the volume of assisted immigration, since the present position was bound to recur with added severity. . ,-

That since all parties alike must accept responsibility for placing on the Statute Book the measures contributing to the present position, no political capital could be made out of a disclosure of the views expressed, and that therefore it was the duty of the Chamber of Commerce to face the facts and impress their importance upon the Government by every means available.