A NATIONAL PROBLEM.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LII, Issue 119, 20 April 1932, Page 3

A NATIONAL PROBLEM.

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —At the recent official re-open-ing of the Centrnl School certain speakers endeavoured to impress upon the pupils, or the rising generation assembled, the necessity of copying, or emulating, the lives or actions of the old pioneers, and, bj living lives of self-sacrifice, industrious and truthfill they would come off victorious and assist to create, like those old pioneers, a-most glorious heritage. Now, sir, all the foregoing sounds very well, but there is a danger of labouring it too much. It is advisable to pause and consider the conditions which existed at that time. And in this connection the present writer has a vivid recollection of the state of affairs obtaining under the provincial form of government prior to its abolition. . With' the establishment of the present, or responsible form of government, came tlie curse of the political railways which proved in many cases to be white elephants, and as a result assisted to create the, present burden of national debt, which we are staggering under. AVe could not foresee what effect a process of evolution would inevitably have with the march of science and the future coming of motor transport, which would assist to cripple these aforesaid railways. We were obsessed with one idea only, namely, borrow money in order to develop the country, and woe betide any aspiring candidate who advocated clinging to the coastal trade only in the form of our waterways—let us obtain the iron horse being our demand. Also, it is all very wetl for the prosent Government and the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Holland, to wrangle over the subject, Optimism versus Pessimism, as it leads nowhere. One is inclined to believe that they aro all opportunists only. AVe must admit that we have got to economise, but how we are going to reach a state of solvency with the present prices of our staple products being so low' and ruinous, is difficult to foresee. —I am, Ct H. J. CANTON, 11 Featherston Street. April 18, 1932.