PROTECTION A FAILURE.

Evening Star, Issue 7266, 18 July 1887, Page 4

PROTECTION A FAILURE.

10 THE EDITOR. Sib,— What about the greatest good a Protective policy is said to secure to the working man, when we find a Melbourne paper, dated 11th June, says: “To show how deep and widespread the distress in Melbourne is, it may be mentioned that one day this week the gas company advertised for a man to prick up a ceiling, merely a few hours’ work—l 27 men applied for the job,” This is what your correspondent, would call “a very small argument against Victoria.” In last Thursday’s EvauiNG Stab he endeavors to score in favor of the Protectionpolicy Colony by showing that Victoria, compared with New South Wales, has three times the amount of land in cultivation; but he keeps out of sight the fact that the Freetrade Colony has forty thousand more horses, twelve thousand more cattle, and twenty-seven million more sheed. In number of pigs, however, Victoria comes to the front. Without entering into never-failing arguments, I can tell and kindred agitators on Protection, that many who left New Zealand on account of hard time 1 , would thankfully accept assistance in the shape of a passage from Melbourne back to Dunedin.—l am, etc., Freetrader. Dunedin, July 15,