WARS, FLOODS, INSURANCE

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 100, 30 April 1938, Page 8

WARS, FLOODS, INSURANCE

Although it was stated at the Imperial Conference last year that Australia had expended more and accomplished more in defence preparation than any other Dominion, a recent calculation indicates that in 1937 the percentage of national in-J come spent on defence in Australia was but 1.5.; in the United Kingdom the percentage was 5.5. The calculation, does not cover New Zealand! defence expenditure, which may be assumed to be much less actually, and much less probably in percentage also. The percentage difference between 1937 expenditures in Australia and in the United Kingdom is sufficient to show that though Australia is reinforcing Britain's 1500 million defence plan (including 400 million of loan money) with a ten million Australian defence loan scheme (including four millions to be borrowed at* once) the. Australian taxpayer's defence burden will still be light compared with that of the British taxpayer. By comparison, New Zealand's contribution to defence will drift still further back, unless the Government takes adequate action to repair the deficiency. A Government that f&f very many years has been actively concerned in insuring human lives and in insuring property against fire should not rtverlook provision against the biggest risk of all—the insurance of New Zealand against invasion. What is the use of insuring property in New Zealand if New Zealand herself is not effectively insured, and if our property is liable to the treatment that much legal property in Austria is receiving? In theory, if not always in practice, New Zealand admits the wisdom of insuring against earthquake. Yet, on the whole, insurance against Nature. is more difficult than defence insurance against a human enemy. Can any country pay heed to other insurances and neglect defence insurance, ignoring all teachings of history? The present Government showed vision when it sent one of its Ministers, Mr. Webb, to fly over the flood-affected country in Hawke's Bay. The Government should not show less vision in defence. A bird's eye view of either the partial devastation of the East Coas?:, or the complete devastation of a lost war, appeals to the deep instinct of selfpreservation. Evidence gathered on the land and in the air inclines Mr. Semple to think that the flood damage may exceed that of the Hawke's Bay earthquake;' and it is certainly no imaginary flight fo say that both of them together amount to a lesser calamity than the loss of our freedom. We must, says Mr. Sayage, "make a complete investigation of the disaster Iwth a view to preventing a recurrence." But one of the safeguards against such disaster —natural forest —has been made war on, under every Government, ever since New Zealand was founded. That is one reason why engineers have been faced with the problem of taking super-flood risks, or (say) of building bridges with much greater clearance above flood, level, at double or treble cost. Nevertheless, however costly insurance against floods must be, and however grievous our deforestation sins may have been, Ministerial utterances indicate that the task of insuring (belatedly) against Nature will not be shirked; nor should New Zealand shirk those insurances against foreign attack that all history shows to be necessary. As a rule, though not always, Nature punishes only our misdeeds; but war is less merciful and needs no excuse for destroying properly and extinguishing human liberty.

Over the causes of war New Zealand has little more control than over I lie causes of earthquake; but New Zealanders can at least take defensive precaution against war, on well-defined lines, and they will be prepared to do so if the danger is presented to them as realistically as floods and earthquakes. With the example of Australia, and the greater example of the British taxpayer,! pointing the way, surely the highest insurance policy that a free people can take out will not be neglected.