BAD WOLF BANNED

Evening Star, Issue 22780, 15 October 1937, Page 1

BAD WOLF BANNED

PREMIER ASSURES GOOD TIMES A LITTLE BOUT WITH THE OPPOSITION [From Our Parliamentary Repoetsb.} WELLINGTON, October 14. Asserting that the Government would have been left without the means of collecting land and income tax had the Opposition’s amendment to the annual Taxing Bill been carried yesterday, the Prime Minister drew the fire of the Opposition' members with some success in the House of Representatives to-night. “ The Leader of the Opposition wanted to know what we would do if prices fell,’* said Mr Savage, “but if the resolution moved by the Opposition had been carried we would have lost £8,500,000 of revenue from land and income tax, because we would have had no machinery to collect it._ We would have been left with questionable indirect forms of taxation for which his Government was responsible before we cam» on to the Treasury benches., It would have left us with the sales tax which we have heard so much about from the people who put it on;i we would have been left, too, with the Customs tax; we would have been unable to pay wages and provide for, social services because the machinery, would not have been there if the Opposition had had its way. Mr Forbes; If it had been carried you would not have been the Govern-* ment.

Mr Savage: It .would have been) worse than ever, because the Opposition would have made an attempt to be the Government. We still have a majority, thank the Lord- for that! The Opposition cannot carry on no matter what happens. Mr Poison; What are you worrying about? Mr Savage: The hon. member will be worrying later on. He had a pretty close run last time ; and he will have a closer one next time. If the resolution had been carried we would have lost £8,500,000 right away. Mr Poison: We would have lost a bad Government. A Government Member: We lost that in 1935. , . Mr Savage: We have the intelligence to know the meaning of all the antics of the Opposition, However, one sympathises with them all the same. “ I want to know how we were going to pay the pensioners if we. had not collected the jmmey in the Budget and covered in this Bin, continued Mr Savage. “They are fairly good talkers, but they are the worst tacticians in the world. If they were not they would not have moved that resolution. The lion, member asked what we are going to do with the bad wolf round the corner when, it turns up. We are not going to let it turn up. As long as we are capable of producing a decent standard of living in New Zealand the people of New Zealand are going to enjoy it. Now then! the member for Patea should understand that. Mr Dickie: I have heard it often enough from you. Mr Poison: ion should have a gramophone record. Mr Savage: We are not going to be harnessed to the chariot wheels of other nations. I think I will leave it at that. Mr Poison: I would. Mr Savage: I got up to talk about: the tactics of the Opposition. It must* make a show, hut I am afraid it is a pretty poor show they are making._ Mr Smith; What about the Prime Minister making a show? ' . Mr Savage: You aro not bad at making a show either. I think you will have a showdown later on. Mr Hamilton: Were you afraid that we would carry the motion? Mr Savage: Not a hit. I don’t think that the hon. member will carry a motion in this House again. All the motions that he has carried belong to the dead past. Mr Savage said he could iiot see tnat they could reduce taxation without cutting out some of the social services* Mr Forbes: The Douglas Credit people say they can do without taxation. . , _ ‘ Mr Savage: The Douglas Credit people can speak for themselves. X am not speaking for them." When the Opposition know half as much as the Douglas Credit people know now, shey, will know about five hundred per cent* more than what they know now. _ If they are anything like mathematician* they can work that out. “The Prime Minister would have to he deserted by more than half his followers before the amendment could have been carried,” commented Mr Forbes, who explained that it was only the registration of a protest. - Mr Poison; He moved precisely the same motion himself two years ago. Mr Forbes: “ But circumstance* alter the viewpoint.” The House, he added, would soon get over the difficulty of paying pensioners or the Public Service if such a motion had been carried, and everyone knew that there was no likelihood of such difficulties being created.