RESTRICTIONS ON INDUSTRY.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LII, Issue 226, 24 August 1932, Page 6

RESTRICTIONS ON INDUSTRY.

REMOVAL URGED. WELLINGTON, Aug. 24. “Over many years we have urged the idea of every man endeavouring to become a master, and we have thereby killed industrial development,” said Mr J. Pearce Luke, president of the Wellington Chamber of Commerce, in an address at the half-yearly meeting of the chamber last evening. In an appeal for the removal of restrictions from industry, Mr Luke stated that it was apparent that public control of enterprise had failed lamentably. He advocated more freedom for employers in making conditions of work agreeable to themselves and to employees, and he appealed for the removal of hampering taxation and bylaws which increased costs without conferring any general benefit. The regrouping of local bodies so as to reduce numbers and obtain co-ordin-ated control at reduced cost was also urged by Mr Luke. Referring to the achievements of the Ottawa Conference, Mr Luke said the agreements reached would undoubtedly be the means of increasing price levels, but the fact must not be overlooked that there would be a still greater necessity for concentration on the problem of reducing the costs of converting farm products into marketable commodities.