Germany To-day a Socialised Land

Manawatu Times, Volume 63, Issue 236, 6 October 1938, Page 10

Germany To-day a Socialised Land

COUNTRY BEHIND HITLER j Mr Harold Hudson, of Dunedin, who has just returned to Dunedin, and who has spent seven months in Germany, where he visited practically all the large towns, gives- some- interesting im- < pressipns of Germany as it is to-day. Mr Hudson learned to speak what he termed conversational German during his stay, and set himself to become acquain- , tod with many phases of life in Germany. lie had the opportunity while in Hamburg of hearing addresses by Dr. Goebbels, Minister of Propaganda, and Field-Marshal Goering, who has charge of the Air Force and the four years plan. Dr. Goebbels was the better speaker of the two, but Goering was a much bigger man and had the greater personality. Popularity of Hitler. Mr Hudson said that there was no doubt that Herr Hitler had the great majority of the German people behind him. He had had many opportunities of forming an opinion on their feeling towards Hitler: The younger people looked on Hitler as the saviour of Ger- > many> but among the older intellectual T and monied classes there was not the 3 same whole-hearted admiration for the Fuhrer. There was np. doubt,, said Mr 3 Hudson, that Hitler had worked a re--1 ( markable change in the conditions of Germany since he had come into power in 1933. At that time, according to figures in the Loudon Times, there had been 6,000,000 unemployed people in \ Germany, whereas the figure had been ’ reduced to 400,000 to-day. ? Nationalised Germany, t ‘‘So far as I see the position,” said | Mr Hudson, “the whole of Germany is 5 1 nationalised under a socialised form of f Government. Practically all tho raw 3 and manufactured materials are under , I Government control arid So is the farmr ing industry. The German policy ap- | pears to me to be that which is now bei j ing introduced by the New Zealand Lat bour Party. There is price fixation of - j all farm' produce, and the cost of this l j produce to the working man is also fixed B I to meet the wages paid—lower than , 3 ; those paid in New Zealand. A German 1 can buy with his wages as much, if not more, than could bo purchased by a working man in New Zealand under similar conditions of. employment. ” Mr Hudson remarked that Germany has 1 had for some time a system of loans to r married couples, these loans to be can- - celled as children are Dorn. Arbeits Front. t ! The Arbeits Front, said Mr Hudson, j is a Government institution which cong trols German labour. Everyone© has to 3 join the Arbeits Front., It fixes the B j wages, settles all industrial disputes, g ! and strikes are declared illegal. The k ‘ Arbeits Front has a representative in most of the larger factories, and he tries to settle any industrial ho is unsuccessful, thee dispute goes to ' gjtho Arbeits Front, and if this institu--0 ; tion cannot get the parties to agree, the dispute goes before what we in New a Zealand term a magistrate. Each party j to the dispute is represented by a law 3 yer, and the decision reached is fina. i and has to be accepted. Thousands of f • disputes are settled without the aid of the final court being invoked, but the t final court also has to deal with a large , f number. • l The Arbeits Front has an auxiliary t body, called the Ivraft -Lurch Freude—i in English, “Strength Through Joy. s The officers of this latter body visit the factories and make suggestions for bets ter working conditions, and also for the i. ’ entertainment of the workers by the provision of gymnasiums, sportsgrounds, bathrooms, etc.. Arrangements are also made with the factories for holidays for tho workers, with financial assistance 1 - ... L *

while they are on holidays. Mr Hudson i says that he visited six factories, and < j that he was much impressed by what * 1 was being done by the Arbeits Front. * IThe Labour Camps. | j Mr Hudson also explained what was i being done in the labour camps. AR 1 Germans between 18 and 25 have to 1 serve six months in these camps, and I , then they have to undergo military service for two years. J j The camps were not military, said Mt ‘ Hudson, and the inmates were provided with clothes, boots, accommodation, and J every thing necessary with the exception of a tooth-brush. Medical and den? . . tal service was also supplied. Ho had had a meal at one of these camps, when j ; heh ad had for company four Germans ( from South Africa. They had come to '; i Germany to do their six months in a i labour camp and two years’, military t ■ service, so as to enable them to take a course at a German university. Tho ; ■ men in the camps were provided with a type of work, such as tho reclamation of areas, building roads in o,ut-of-tho- ( way places, etc., which would not affect the ordinary employment of men.. j Working Man’s Home, s Mi- Hudson attended the Leipsig fail • and in the desire to obtain a first-hand , impression of the accomriiodation pro-1 . vided for working men, he had spent [ two nights in a block of flats built for I 5 sueh accommodation. The beds werejl i clean and the food good, but not up to r • the standard which the people of New p . Zealand are‘ accustomed to. The cost of p : bed and breakfast was 3s, which was I * : rather high in Mr Hudson’s opinion,'] i ; but no doubt the keen demand for ae t | .commodation during the fair had caused !< i an advance in the usual prices charged. M i * Care of School Children. |1 Mr Hudson visited the school in the ' poorer quarters of Hamburg, and had a } I meal with the children. They are pro t 5 . vided with a piece of sausage and pota ] g toes and carrots stewed, daily, and also 1 r with a glass of milk and a biscuit daily ( f Under-nourished children have also to take, under a doctor’s orders, a spoon ful of cod liver oil daily. The cost ( 3d per week for each child. ] The children are required to collect t . the left over bones, scraps, etc., so that c , they may bo utilised in some way or £ | ether. p j Combating Foot-and-Mouth Disease. t While Mr Hudson was in Southern t Germany foot-and-moufh disease was t rife—particularly round Stuttgart. It r was also prevalent in England at that f time, To show how the Germans met i sueh an epidemic, the car In which he j was travelling had to pass over sawdust impregnated with disinfectant, and then the travellers had to alight from the car and stand in the sawdust. In the villages tho doorsteps of the houses and ) the .shops were also, disinfected. Stuttgart is far from the Rhine, but • fortifications were ever being carried ► out here. A notice stated that the park- . ing of cars was not allowed near by, nor 5 were hikers allowed in the locality. I 1 Export of Motor Cars. Great advances are being mado in the ■ manufacture of motor cars, and last « year some 8000 11.9h.p. Opal cars had been exported to England from Ger : many. These were costing £135 in Eng- ' land, and they cost almost the same in ' Germany. Taking into account the high exchange and a 33 1-3 per cent, duty, 1 freight, etc., it could be realised that ' the manufacturers had to be heavily t subsidised to enable the cars to be ' placed in England at this figure. A s Morris eight or an Austin seven—a somewhat similar type of ear to the r Opal, cost approximately £135 in Eng- ■ land. The Soldiery. 5 The Storm Troopers and tho Brown • Shirts are civilian troops, and the Black } Shirts—the pick of all the troops —are 3 Herr Hitler’s bodyguard. They carry > the .gkull and crossbones on their caps. 3 Mr Hudson asked one of the soldiers f the significance of the skull and cross--5 bones and he intimated that it meant that they would die for* the Fuhrer. “Heil, Hitler.” »-j When a person goes into a I ment office he at once says “Heil, Hit- | ler” to the officer in charge, who replies 2 with a similar salutation. A GovernS ment official rang up on the telephone y introduces his reply with “Heil, HitJj ler, ” he concludes his letters with ) “Heil Hitler” and his name, and the

proprietors of shops greet their customers with 11 Heil, Hitler* * or in effect “good day,*' and as they leave he says “Heil, Hitler,* * or “good-bye.** Before a foreigner knows what he is doing he finds himself also giving the “Heil, Hitler** salute. The salutation has really become more or less automatic. Plag at Half Mast. In Budapest, capital of Hungary, a flag i 3 still hanging at half mast in one of the squares. At the foot of the flag pole is soil lifted from that part of the country taken from Hungary, and the flag is to fly at half mast until that land is returned to Hungary. The Sudeten Germans. Mr Hudson had intended to visit Prague, the capital of Czechoslovakia, but a Gorman friend in Hamburg persuaded him not to do so, in view of the intense feeling between the German* and the Czechs. There was no doubt a very bitter feeling between the Germans and tha Czechs, said Mr Hudson, and if he could believe all he had heard the Germau Sudetens had some cause l for complaint. The Germans have an I intense hatred of any form of Communism in any form. They call Communism Public Enemy No. I. | ——