STATE CONTROL DANGERS.

Evening Star, Issue 25225, 12 July 1944, Page 4

STATE CONTROL DANGERS.

Wise words were uttered hy Bishop Holland at the opening of the Wellington Diocesan Synod yesterday. A suggestion he. made was that after the war the fight for freedom would enter a new and critical phase, in which State planning and State control will he actively concerned. This is no new idea. It has been expressed on the platform and in the Press on many occasions in the last few years, but tho bishop's statement emphasises the very dangerous trend that now exists. Germany made the State supreme, tmd chaos in that country to-day is the result. The war unfortunately gave the Government of this country extensive powers of control by regulation. This was necessary, of courso, in conducting the war plans, but a question that now arises is as to what extent Ministers will be prepared to relax the regulations' when peace comes. The process of necessity will he gradual, and it will be a test of the Government's sincerity in the desire expressed by some of its prominent members to see the affairs of the Dominion' resume their normal course. The Acting Prime Minister said recently that " We are pursuing a policy of abolishing or modifying controls as experience shows this course to be either possible or wise." In this connection a statement has been made by Australia's Prime Minister, in -which' he favoured the retention of sweeping Government controls for a " period " after the war. It is admitted that, as in the case of the last war, control in certain forms will bo necessary in the adjustments that will have to be made when peace comes. Mr Curtin's use of the words " for a period after the war," suggests ultimate relaxation of the powers now held, but that would appear to be a difficult process, for Governments are notoriously reluctant to yield powers that they have acquired. In his address, Bishop Holland say 6 we must deliberately make room for freedom of all kinds. That envisages the fight that is coming. The president of the Chamber of Commerce of the United States said recently, in discussing tho encroachment by bureaucracy: "We are heading for the civil service, all of us. For bureaucracy has only that to offer. Bureaucraoy can have benevolence, goodwill, competence, a whole team of virtues, but it has no outside jobs. You work for the State, or else? " That is the issue that will have to be faced. It will be a struggle for free enterprise in all departments of life. The question to be put to the people of New Zealand in days not far ahead will be: " Is the suiii total of all ambition to be found in the straitjacket of Socialism and bureaucratic dictatorship? " ____,