WHO ENDED THE SLUMP?

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVI, Issue 72, 22 September 1943, Page 4

WHO ENDED THE SLUMP?

Sir, —Listening to Mr. Semple on Saturday night I heard the old story of Labour pulling this country out of the slump. But in the quiet calm of my fireside I was able to examine the facts, and had the following table of importations of motor-cars before me: 1931, motor-cars imported, 3388; 1932, motor-cars imported, 3044; 1933, motorcars imported, 2933; 1934, motor-cars imported, 11,747; 1935, motor-cars imported, 17,844. In the zero years of the slump only 9365 cars could be imported, but in 1934 and 1935 the position had so improved that 29,591 motorcars were required to meet the demand. Did not this indicate that the slump was well passing away before the Government got into power, for it did not assume office till the end of 1935, and therefore could not have influenced those conditions. I also remembered that shopkeepers definitely stated that the Christmas trade of 1934 showed much improvement, and we all know that unemployment was less in 1934 and 1935 than in the years 1931 to 1933. "To say the Labour Government got us out of the slump is folly, but it is true it came into power on the wave of prosperity and exploited it for all it