RELIEF SUBSIDY

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 125, 22 November 1935, Page 18

RELIEF SUBSIDY

TWO LARGE GRANTS

MR. SEMPLE COMPLAINS

The administration of the unemployment fund, and the granting of sub- ( sidies to the Southland Freezing Com- . pany, and the Prudential Insurance Company were strongly condemned by Mr. R. Semple, Labour candidate for , Wellington East, at the Ratepayers' . Hall, Melrose, last night. Mr. Semple - devoted most of his time to these ; matters which had previously been defended by his opponent, Mr. O. C. Mazengarb (Nationalist). Mr. Semple said that the session before last he was responsible for making a statement in 'Parliament attacking the Minister of Employment for having permitted a subsidy to be paid' to the Southland Freezing Company, of which he was a shareholder, while he was still trustee of the Unemployment Fund. Mr. Semple said he had looked up the "Bulletin," which, although not a Labour paper, was looked upon as one of the best critics of balance-sheets in Australasia, and had found that the Southland company had paid a dividend 0f.38J per cent, in 1934 and at the same time had transferred £37,000 to reserve, making a tota. reserve of £188,030. This 38J per cent, dividend, continued Mr. Semple, had been extracted from the farmers, the clients of the company, to whom the sum of £14,350,000 was paid by means of the exchange to keep on the land. NEW BUILDINGS. Mr. Semple said that when he exposed the position in Parliament he felt he had a duty to do seeing that money was being taken out of the Unemployment Fund to construct additional buildings for the Southland company, which was making such a huge profit out of the farmers to whom the rest of the community was paying millions to keep on the land. Mr. Hamilton, knowing the profits the company was making, had subsidised that company out of the money that was taken from the taxpayers to keep the unemployed men, women, and childrei. of New Zealand decently fed and clothed. Mr. Mazengarb had said that no Labour man would dare to go down to Wallace and say what was being whispered round Wellington. "There has been no whispering campaign," said Mr. Semple. "I told Mr. Hamilton to his teeth in Parliament." He had said that Mr. Hamilton was making use of the position for his own material welfare, and when he made a statement like that he stood up to it. He had defied the Speaker to place his statement on record. Mr. Mazengarb had also said that he would not have courage enough to go down south and make a similar statement. Mr. Semple said he had in fact gone down to Mr. Hamilton's constituency and had there told the same story that he had told in Parliament. When Mr. Hamilton went back to his electorate he struck the storm that had been created, and had threatened to sue him if he thought he was a man of means. This week he (Mr. Semple) had telegraphed to Mr. Hamil- \ ton's opponent asking him to challenge Mr. Hamilton to take action against him for making that statement. > The only defence raised to the grant- , ing of the subsidy was that the com- ' pany had given some unemployed , workers some meat. (Laughter.) Why did a company with a reserve of . £188,000 seek a subsidy to build a \ building? One would have thought ] it would have spent the money without putting its fingers into the penny \ box of the poor. "If I had done a \ thing like that I would have hung my \ head in shame for trie rest of. my j life," said Mr. Semple. ( ■ A voice: How much did they get? , Mr. Semple: They got £1000 when they had £188,000. They gave the \ unemployed some meat and they gave j them some manure to put on their , crops. Referring to Mr. Mazengarb's statement that no Labour man would dare ( to make the allegation in. Southland Mr. Semple said he' had met Mr. Mazengarb and told him that no man ( who knew him would dare to challenge his courage. PRUDENTIAL INSURANCE CO. Dealing next with the subsidy granted to the Prudential Insurance Company, Mr. Semple said that that company was the richest of it's kind in the world. The total subsidy ap- • proved in this instance amounted to .1 £16,000. Mr. Mazengarb had said < that of that amount only £4500 or something like that had been accepted by the company. Mr. Semple was not prepared to question that. 1 He had taken his figures from the ] percentage quoted in Parliament. If the company had not taken the money that did not matter. What he was ' criticising was not so much the action < of the insurance company, but the ( action of the Unemployment Board in permitting a subsidy to be authorised. ' Mr. Semple then criticised the Gov- ' ernment for permitting a board to take , over the unemployment funds. The ( Government, he said, had thought fit j to set up a board and that board had t | governed ' itself by regulation and ( placed itself almost outside the reach of Parliament. The Government had f delegated to three or four men the power to spend £4,500,000 a year as \ they thought fit. The whole system, ( said Mr. Semple, was nothing more or j less than a scandal. { At the conclusion of his address, Mr. c Semple was accorded a vote of thanks ( t and confidence by an appreciative j audience. Mrs. C. Stewart was in the chair. c