PLANNED NATIONAL INDUSTRY.

Evening Star, Issue 20864, 6 August 1931, Page 8

PLANNED NATIONAL INDUSTRY.

As a benefit to Russians, as a threat to the outer world, as something that is succeeding, as something doomed inevitably to failure, the Russian Fiveyear Plan has been discussed. Its success or failure is for time to prove, as only three of its five years have expired yet. Up till now, while it has abolished unemployment, it has not done so much for Russians as to prevent them from having by all accounts an exceedingly hard time; and its conscription nature and general regimentation would certainly not be accepted by Tee communities, a small minority of whoso members profess to envy it, unless they were at tho last point of desperation. _ But tho system has one virtue which is incontestable —it looks ahead; it is a plan. And business and industry in capitalist countries are unplanned in any general sense. There is searching of hearts and admission of errors during a depression, and after that national effort goes forward onco more with immense ardour, cheerfully and blindly, as if no depression could ever occur again. How to overcome this weakness of fortuitousness in tho prevailing system has formed a problem for sonic of the strongest minds during present hard, times. When Lord Melchctt said that tho right thing to do with tho Russian Five-year Plan was not to abuse it, but to imitate it, ho did not mean that it should bo copied in all its harshnesses. Ho meant that the Russian example should bo imitated by other industrial nations in looking ahead and in having a plan. Mr Churchill in England has suggested that there should bo an economic Parliament, associated with the present Parliament, but of much smaller numbers, consisting entirely of business men and industrialists, who should mako recommendations to the latter body on their special subjects, and to whom all such questions should bo referred. They would be chosen partly from the House of Commons and partly by tho industries themselves. American proposals, as might bo expected, go much further than this. Mr Stuart Chase, economist, recalling tho success of tho War Industries Board in bringing order out of chaos, believes that there should bo a Peace Industries Board to draft a Ton-year Plan. Its object, ho suggests, should bo a minimum family wage of 5,000d0l by 1943, which reads certainly like hitching one’s wagon to a star. Professor Charles A. Beard, another economist, would have a National Economic Council to co-ordinate tho basic industries and plan their activities in advance.

Another movement, in which Mr James W. G crard, former Ambassador to Germany, and Mr Matthew Well, vice-presidort vf tho American Federation of Labour, aro moving spirits, has a Ton-year Plan for its aim. “Wc need,” says Mr Woll, “to meet tho cold-blooded Communist Fivo-yenr Plan with a warm-blooded Ton-year Plan of democratic idealism, woven into tho very pattern of our national fabric.” Tho essential task, as envisaged hy Mr Woll, includes the following: —“To determine the annual national human requirements in commodities and service for ten years. To determine the immediate visible supply of required commodities. To apportion among the industrial divisions their respective tasks of production and handling. To determine tho available labour hours in human terms, on tho initial basis of the six-hour day and tho five-day week. To determine and apportion tho required labour hours for tho production and handling of commodities to the point of consumption. To determine tho character and extent of industrial equipment required, and to apportion tho task of its design, equipment, and installation.” It looks a task almost beyond human wisdom, but the Russian Five-year Plan has never continued on a liipsb basis. It has been modified and adapted again and again as results have pointed the need. Mr Churchill's suggestion of a subordinate Parliament might bo as well suited to British requirements as any other scheme. It might attract the services of able business men and industrialists who hesitate to give them to a general Parliament, with its greater demands on their time. If it were adopted in New Zealand it would combine the roles of Chambers of Commerce, Farmers' Unions, and Manufacturers’ Associations, working separately now, in a single body strong enough to face tasks of organisation and direction which may continue to bo too exacting for tho ■■Unemployment Board.