"FOR PARTY PURPOSES"

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 51, 7 September 1928, Page 11

"FOR PARTY PURPOSES"

"DAILY HERALD" STATEMENT

FACTS BETTER THAN COMMENT

A reply was made by tho Priino Minister (tho Eight Hon. J. G. Coates), yesterday to the further cabled statement, published in the London "Daily Herald," that hundreds of starving men are walking the roads in New Zealand. "Facts aro better than any comment," said Mr. Coates, "and the fact that New Zealand has the lowest proportion of unemplpyed to ■ the population in any country in the world is an effective answer to the statements which have been made by the "Daily Herald." The returns showed that in the United States at the end of 1927 tho unemployed ratio was one to 28. In Great Britain at March of this yoar the ratio was one in 38, in Queensland it was one in 63, in New South Wales one in 107 and for the whole of the Commonwealth it was one in 190. For New Zealand the figures were one in 375. "Wo in New Zealand know that it is an exaggeration to suggest that there are hundreds of starving men walking tho roads or that. large numbers of migrants are in dire distress," the Priino Minister said. "We know there is unemployment and tho Government lias not sought to minimise its real extent. We have- preferred to face the position fairly and squarely in an endeavour to find work to tide the men over their difficulty*. For party purposes there are those who seek to magnify the position. Instead of lending assistance to the Government in finding a solution of the problem. . "As far as the migrants are concerned," Mr. Coates added, "close contact is maintained with them by tho Immigration Department, and for every one who has complained of the treatment accorded him in the country of his adoption, there are hundreds who have nothing but gratitude for the assistance they have received."