THREATS AND EVASION

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 77, 28 September 1938, Page 12

THREATS AND EVASION

On the vital issues which confron New Zealand at the present time th« r public are entitled to know exactlj c where the Government stands, but ir its approach to credit and currenc) problems the Labour Party is speaking with so many voices that many electors may be misled on th( a implications of the policy which il is placing before the country. Wher he spoke at Christchurch last even c ing, the Prime Minister dealt al G some length with the Government's determination to use the public credit but he said nothing to clarify in the mind of the electors what this really means. His speech was an advance in one sentence and a retreal in the next. Particularly confusing • were his references to the part which r the private banks may be expected lo play in the economic life of the Dominion. Mr. Savage was obviously anxious to avoid a straight-out „ declaration of Avar. He was not preP pared to say with Mr. J. A. Lee that with a Socialist Government in power, " the Bank of New Zealand and, indeed, r the banking system of New Zealand, must finally be owned in their entirety, ■ else the Government is Socialist in I name only. : But he did go part of the distance. » If the banking corporations would 1 not do it, the Government would have to do it, said the Prime Minister. The banking corporations in New Zealand were doing better during the last two years than they had before, as the ratio of advances to deposits would show. Mr. Savage also saw the need for some "uniformity" in the banking system, and he went on: It was just as necessary for the nation to be the sole authority for the issue and control of money as it was for it to be the sole authority for the organisation and control of the Army and Navy. Even if they were agreed that the money system was not -as good as it should be, it was necessary for the free life of industry and the welfare of the community. If in these utterances of the Prime Minister there is no direct statement that Labour will take over the banking system of New Zealand in its entirety (to use Mr. Lee's words) there is certainly a definite suggestion that the private banks must dance to the Government's tune. In making that suggestion, indeed, Mr. Savage is doing no more than adopting the implications of the references in Labour's election manifesto to the control by the State of currency and credit. In extension of its policy, the manifesto states, the Government proposes! to maintain and extend the control of j credit and currency until the State is' the sole authority for the issue of credit and currency. Carried to its logical conclusion, this can mean but one thing—that, given; the chance, Labour will go the full distance along the Socialistic road — and no amount of generalisation, such as that contained in Mr. Savage's speech at Christchurch, will permit of any escape. In his efforts to draw a veil over the real meaning of Labour's credit and currency policy, the Prime Minister has not always been well served by his friends. Mr. Lee's refreshing candour on the eve of an election has materially assisted the public to reach a true assessment of what an endorsement of Labour's policy will mean, but he has not been alone in his frankness. There is, for instance, the statement made by Mr. J. W. Munro, the Labour candidate for Dunedin North, in November, 1935. We intend to create money, said Mr. Munro on that occasion. We are told that economists say that it cannot be done. Well, we are giving it a trial. I believe it can be done. I believe it must be done. In the face of such a statement, and in the face of the statements contained both in the Labour Party's own manifesto and in Mr. Lee's book, the conclusion cannot be escaped that, in spite of its many voices, Labour's objective is clear. It plainly seeks full control of the monetary system and just as plainly that cannot be brought about unless the private banks and other.financial institutions are completely dominated by the State. It will take more than the protestation by the Labour candidate for Dunedin Central (Mr. Neilson) that "it is no part of the purpose of Labour to socialise the banks" and the airy generalities of Mr. Savage to convince the public otherwise. No matter how many voices are heard, Labour's monetary policy is open to one interpretation and one interpretation alone.