ECONOMIC ILLS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXII, Issue 155, 16 June 1932, Page 10

ECONOMIC ILLS

SUGGESTED IMPROVEMENTS THE NEED FOR ADJUSTMENT ADDRESS IN NAPIER. An expression of views upon what is wrong with New Zealand and the world as a whole to-day and some suggestions in the alteration of government and monetary systems which would effect an improvement was given by Mr J. H. Edmundson to a largely attended meeting under the auspices of the Napier Chamber of Commerce last evening. In introducing the speaker the chairman, Mr M. S. Spence, stated that the present position in New Zealand to-day was due to two principal facts, firstly the decline in the value of exports and secondly the cessation in the borrowing of money because none was available. The price that was being obtained for our exports, he said, could not very well be altered as they were entirely at the mercy of factors outside our control. As far as the borrowing of money was concerned he was of the opinion that the time had come when we should set our house in order. In the past borrowing had been treated as revenue and now when there was no further money available from this source wc could not expect to continue our social services. Mr Edmundson said: "We are up against it. the country is up against it, England is up against it, the Empire is up against it, the whole world is up against it. The time is therefore here for us to take our gloves off and call a spade a spade. Not to mince matters, but to analyse the position and speak out and demand a reformation. ATTACK ON SYSTEM. "At the inception, I want it clearly understood that I am not making a personal attack on the individual members of Parliament or the individual members of our civil service. My attack is against the system—not against the individuals. I will give you my opinions as the result of observation and reading, and I will endeavour to give you authorities and quote you their own words, and prove that I only share with these authorities the opinions that I will express. "After this address is over, I hope you will all share these opinions with me, and not only share them with me, but get all the people with whom you come in contact to share them with you. Because the only chance we have of effecting a cure is by getting enough people to think tho same as we are thinking and to talk about it and talk about it in earnest, and please realise, Mr Chairman and gentlemen, that unless we get the trouble cured, this

civilisation is doomed to destruction and will go the same way as many a one that has preceded it. “We will look at the taxation figures for New Zealand as published in the Official Year Book. They stand as follows: 1914, £5,918,034 per annum; 1918 £12,340,853 per annum; 1931, £18,597,456 per annum. In other words for every £lOO paid in taxation in 1914 we had to pay £206 in 1918 and £3lO in 1931. We now have to pay over three times as much in taxation as we did in 1914. "One of the reasons for this increase is the increase in State indebtedness, which according to the official book is as follows: 1914, £99,730,427; 1918. £150,840,055; 1931. £276,033,358. Again, for every £lOO debt in 1914, we owed £l5l in 1918 and £276.5 in 1931. "By these figures it will bo noted that the rate of increase in taxation has been greater than the increase in State indebtedness. This indicates that the Government must have been incurring other excessive expenditures besides increasing its debt. So much for taxation in the meantime. EXTRA STATE DEPARTMENTS. "The next point that we have to refer to is legislation. During the past' few years wo have had several extra departments of State added to the already prodigious list. By legislation, by regulation and the operations of State departments the Government of this country is competing with and strangling private enterprise and so reducing the numbers of the taxpayers, and consequently each year throwing a heavier burden on those that are left. As the process proceeds it is obvious that tho rate of retrogression is accelerated. Unless it is stopped immediately the very foundations of our civilisation are threatened and we are all doomed to ruination, starvation and destruction. "The third cause that we touched upon was that of popular sentiment. This Is the most serious one of tho three in my opinion, because owing to its manifestation the two previous causes are induced. We recognise all round us the popular desire of so many people to ‘get the Government to do it.’ They seem to think the Government can afford to do things that private individuals cannot afford to do. Their conception is that as long as the money ean be found the thing in question can be done.

"Mr Chairman and gentleman, it is your duty and my duty to do all in our power to alter this popular sentiment of leaning towards socialistic effort in our midst, and I appeal to you to do your utmost before it is too late. We should have recognised the position years ago, and made our protest and used every power in our possession to combat the evil. It’s no use crying over spilt milk, however, but I want you all to make up your minds to-night that in the future you will do all in your power to let everybody know what a humbug socialism is. “Nowadays it is realised by the people that the socialistic operations of the Government are clogging the wheels of industry and the desire for change is here. This desire for change is the renaissance and the reformation can only take place by the State withdrawing from industry and commerce and confining its operations to its proper function, that of Jaw making and administration. PRIVATE ENTERPRISE.

“The various governments of the world are indulging in conferences and discussions as to how they can restore prosperity. All they have to do is to reduce the numbers of the civil servants to a fraction of the number they have now and withdraw from competition with private enterprise and prosperity would be restored in a very short time. As soon as capital was assured that excessive taxation and the Government squandering of money was to cease, capital would pour into private enterprise and everyone would

be employed. The discharged civil servants would be absorbed into industry and production. As proof of this I can point to dozens of superannuated civil servants who are in private employment or in business on their own accounts. They have been absorbed into industry. “Industry in the first instance, created a system of government to make laws and administer them, but unfortunately tho Government has allowed it’s bureaucrats too much latitude and these bureaucrats have gathered to themselves far too much power and now by their operations, are engaging in business and production and thus entering into competition with the industrialists with the tax-payer and, mind you, with the tax-payers’ money and moreover making the tax-payer pay the losses incurred by bureaucratic control and mismanagement. “I have already referred to the renaissance of the 16th century. On that occasion, the idea of the Renaissance was to free the Church and the State from the clogging that was in vogue. To-day we have a modein Renaissance and it is the desire of the people to free industry from the clogging produced by the State. By state interference in private enterprise, in other words by socialism. Socialism imposed by the state is clogging industry. This renaissance I say is here and the people desire the change. It is not only here now but I will prove to you that it was with us in 1925. “It is generally conceded that there are in this country, about eight manual workers to one executive. If this is so, and for the purpose of this argument we will admit it, then 1 will! say that the workers and the people did not want socialism because the Reform Party went to the country with that splendid slogan ‘Less government m business and more business in Government.’ ”

FED UP WITH SOCIALISM. 'j’his slogan raised the hopes of the people—they were fed up with socialism and they put the Reform Party in with a wonderful majority. They captured 54 seats out of 80, indicating that the people were dissatisfied with socialistic methods and were desirous of breaking away from the bonds that fettered them. If that slogan does not mean the jettisonising of socialism, what does it mean? The great majority of the voters thought that it meant that and that is why the Reform Party had such a thumping majority. In other words the peopfe had at that time the idea of the renaissance and put the party in to effect the reformation. “Why did the party fail to effect the reformation? Simply because bureaucracy got its insidious propaganda to work within Parliament and Parliament fell. “The majority of the people supported the idea of the renaissance in 1925. 1 suggest without fear of contradiction that the idea has more supporters to. day than it had in 1925. The people to-day know that the things that wc have said to night ai< fundamentally true and they are just crying out for the reformation. Unless the reformation is effected civilisation is doomed. DISCUSSION BY MEETING.

At the conclusion of Mr Edmundson’s address questions were invited. Mr J. S. Barton stated that he was heartily in agreement with the speaker in the main theme of his address. He was also of the opinion that economics should be taught to a greater extent in the schools, and one lesson he suggested was that the children bring along a money box to school and place a penny in it every week and that they be taught that they could not take out more than they put into it. “We run down the Government system,” said Mr N. Kettle, “but it is the people who are responsible and we should not lose sight of that fact. It is the people who are making the Government do what it is doing. We want to order our system and that is to be done by the people.” In moving that Mr Edmundson be accorded a hearty vote of thanks for his address the chairman said that the important thing about conditions today was the decline of self-help in the ordinary individual. He had always felt that the people of New Zealand were too spoon fed and looked to the Government for everything, and was of the opinion that it should be instilled into the children that the Government was themselves. It should be drilled into the people that if they were getting money out of the Government they were only getting it out of themselves. There was no doubt, he said, that the stock of people in New Zealand was not like that of the pioneers. They were not self-reliant or enterprising. He was in agreement with Mr Edmundson when he said that, the present situation could not be laid at the door of the banks. If the exchange was put up to, say, 130, the farmers would get the benefit, but someone had to pay, and that was the importers. The vote of thanks was carried.