H.B. TRIBUNE SATURDAY, DECEMBER 5, 1931 HELPING THE GOVERNMENT.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXI, Issue 302, 5 December 1931, Page 4

H.B. TRIBUNE SATURDAY, DECEMBER 5, 1931 HELPING THE GOVERNMENT.

Though there may still be a few seats in the House of Representatives of which the future occupancy is as yet in some little doubt, there seems no reason for thinking that there will be any appreciable disturbance of party distribution as disclosed by the voting figures already announced. Whatever may be the result of counts still to be made, there would need to be something in them entirely out of the way to leave the Coalition Government without a very substantial working majority. There will, of course, be at least one Cabinet seat to fill as the result of Mr. David Jones’s defeat, and possibily there may also be in view some reshuffling of other portfolios, but that is a process that should not take very long. No great time, therefore, need be lost in setting to work on the serious task of reorganisation and reconstruction—for that is what it really amounts to—that faces the country. So much depends on outside conditions, varying almost from day to day and so far with no very strong indication of early betterment in their bearing on this country, that the job is manifectly beset with a great many difficulties. The most we can do here to help in overcoming them is to prepare ourselves as best wc

may for some little continuance of the lean time through which we are passing. That is almost inevitable unless there is some such very distinct change as we are in no way entitled to expect. The main problem that calls for immediate attention is, of course, that of unemployment, for there can be no feeling of ease among the community at large until it is solved. It may be taken with assurance that the Government is even more impressed with this than are the general body of the people, so that the laying out of some definite programme may be hoped for at an early date. At the same time, the Government is fully entitled to expect that wherever there are private reesoures that can be utilised to the same end there will now be no hesitation in putting them to the purpose in every way possible. It is for the citizens of this country, and particularly for those with means at command, to recognise that persistence in the idea of looking to the Government to get us out of all our troubles is only going to land us into more of them. Without the hearty sympathy and co-operation of the people themselves—and this applies to all classes—the task of the Government will be almost hopeless. It must be realised at once that the national finances of the country are being strained to their very utmost limit and that the Government is just as hard put to it as the rest of us.

We are all very apt to talk—and in the past with some fair warrant—of the barren expenditure of which our Governments have been guilty. The best way we can take for minimising this is for those who have the means to look with all eagerness for remunerative undertakings into which they can put them and which will at the same time yield a livelihood to others. The only alternative must be that the Government will have to tax them still more heavily in order to satisfy the pressing cry for work for willing hands to do. On the other hand, there is equally an obligation on the part of the wage-earners to meet the times with a recognition of the unquestionable fact that there is a very definitely limited amount of money coming into the country that has to be made to go round. Thus, if there is going to be anything like a fair apportionment of it, it must necessarily be on a restricted scale. The sooner we can get such capital as is left to us and the workers of the country acting cordially together, the sooner are we going to see a lifting of the clouds that now gloom over both. Sitting back and merely carping at the Government as if it were something with unfathomable resources at command is going to get us nowhere except further into the mire.