SHORTAGE OF WORK

Evening Post, Volume CIV, Issue 22, 26 July 1927, Page 10

SHORTAGE OF WORK

ECONOMIC CAUSES

GOVERNMENT'S POLICY

LIMITED LIABILITY

Addressing the conference of the Farmers' Union to-day, the Prime Minister (the Eight Hon. J. G. Coates) referred briefly to unemployment.

"If we remember," siud Mr. Coates, "that on the 31st March we- were ten millions short of tho previous year's purchasing power and that there had been a general disinclination, and rightly so, on the part of local bodies to borrow, and that the Government itself had controlled borrowing, the natural result must be that there was less money to go round; the inevitable result must bo that there was difficulty in regard to employment. The Government has done its best from its point of view. Whether you are able to agree with it or not I cannot say, but 1 hope you do. We say that we are not responsible for th« employment of men at a standard rate of rages, but we do say that we are responsible to an extent in endeavouring to relieve the position anH to provide work where possible—work that will be remunerative to the country at a rate which will give temporary relief, and temporary relief only. (Hear, hear.) We say that it is not the responsibility of the Government to take men on and employ them continually. We are in much the same position as many private employers—that is, that our resources are not like a bottomless pit, for we can come to the end of our resources. A Minister may seem hardhearted. In my opinion the ■ course we have taken is the only possible course to pursue, and we ask employers and everybody to assist to the extent of their means. AYe cannot see that more could have been done in respect to giving attention to the provision of temporary relief, and not taking on men at a permanent, charge to the country, but simply for the purpose of tiding them over .the difficulty temporarily, and with the object of their seeking other work from other employers as the days pass by."