LABOUR'S SOCIALISM

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 107, 9 May 1938, Page 16

LABOUR'S SOCIALISM

(To the Editor.) i Sir,—lt would appear from certain i public utterances of his which you i report' ■ that: Mr. O. C. Mazengarb, : newly-appointed Nationalist candidate : for the Wellington , Suburbs elector ate, is either ignorant, of the nature of Socialism or else is misrepresenting the purpose and proposals' of the Labour movement. To demonstrate my point, allow me to select for comment but one sentence from his published speech. ' . • Mr. Mazengarb said: "I hope to convince them (i.e., working men and women) that there can be no opportunity for individual advancement, no security, for their" earnings, and no real comfort in the evening of their lives by following the Socialist policy of pulling down one another's houses and robbing Peter, to pay Paul." Such, in part, is the view of Socialism which this politician would have us accept. Let. me correct his errors. "There can be no opportunity,' we are told, "for individual advancement." Under Socialism, the economic relationship of the citizen to the community will be determined, in general, by the fornjula, "From ekch according to his ability, td each according to his work.'' Social position will be gpverned byt the value oi tW individual's contributions to society;' Thus, personal capabilities will be the only; limiting factors in the * Socialist citizen's rise to increasing heights of'honour, responsibility,and material recognition; He proceeds to remark: "(There can be) no security for, their, earnings." In the Socialist"Commonwealth, banking institutions will be owned and controlled by the people, so that the total resources of the community' will provide the security for savings.; Furthermore, Socialist policy includes the stabilisation ; of the value., of money; tine's earnings, from period to period, will maintain their purchasing power. Finally, under Socialism, equitably remunerated employment will be. a right guaranteed to all workers. Thus, despite Mr. Mazengarb, and for these three reasons, eairnings in the Socialist State will be quite safe.

"No real comfort in the evening of their lives." A Socialist community will secure the most efficient utilisation of its resources, and will distribute the products • equitably amongst all' good i citizens. Thus, "real comfort," not only "in the evening of their lives," but during their entirety, will be an Unquestioned right of all those who are willing to co-operate in the! purposive activities of the community;

"The Socialist policy of pulling down one another's houses" is a policy for a discussion of which I search my Socialist library in vain. I shall allow it, therefore, to return to Mr. Mazengarb's imagination. His final reference to "robbing Peter to pay Paul" is equally .devoid of relevance to Socialist theory arid practice. Socialism will reduce the 'present grossly unfair gap between the upper and lower ranges of income, and Socialism will transfer the ownership and control of the means of production, distribution, and exchange from ■ private hands to the hands, of the people, but to suggest that these processes - are. equivalent to robrbery .is so patently : silly as to be un* worthy of further comment. And yet, says' Mr. Mazengarb, "I, for one, am not against Labour"!—l am,, WM. L. ROBERTSON.