CONDITIONS IN RUSSIA

Evening Star, Issue 21007, 22 January 1932, Page 9

CONDITIONS IN RUSSIA

NEW ZEALANDER'S IMPRESSIONS FIVE-YEAR PLAN BREAKING DOWN Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright. SYDNEY, January 22. (Received January 22, at 9 a.m.) Mr Robert Laidlaw, manager of the Farmers’ Trading Company, Auckland, accompanied by his wile, arrived at Sydney en route to New Zealand after a world tour of thirty-three countries, including Russia. Interviewed, Mr Laidlaw said he spent several days at Leningrad and Moscow, and was deeply impressed by the sordid conditiohs. There was an absence of private trading as Europeans knew it. The stores were poor, and there was difficulty in obtaining decent meals, except at exorbitant prices. He did not see a butcher’s or shoe shop in Moscow. All the people possessed generally was what they stood up in. Russia’s Five Year Plan, ho believed, was a very earnest attempt to rationalise tho nation, but it appeared to bo breaking down because of the shortage of exports over imports. It was certainly not discreet to look clean in Russia. It was far better to go about unshaven. The people, allegedly, were satisfied with their lot because there was simply no alternative.

Mr and Mrs Laidlaw are returning to New Zealand by the Maunganui to-day.