Notable War Effort of the Dominion

Manawatu Times, Volume 70, Issue 269, 14 November 1945, Page 8

Notable War Effort of the Dominion

Mr, Fraser’s Review of The Past Six Years WELLINGTON, Nov. 12. “It is doubtful whether any country made a greater contribution to the war effort than did New Zealand in relation to size and population,” said the Prime Minister (E.t. Hon. P. Fraser) addressing the annual conference of the New Zealand Labour Party. Altogether 205,000 men and women joined the Armed Forces during the war and 135,000 served overseas. Mr. Fraser paid a tribute to the achievements of the New Zealand forces in many theatres of war and made special mention of the service given by the Maori units.

“In addition to the purely military contribution,” he said, “New Zealand succeeded in increasing primary production, so that Britain and later the United States forces could be supplied with the greatest possible quantities of foodstuffs. New Zealand shipped to Britain 1,800,000 tons of meat, 685,000 tons of butter and 625,000 tons of cheese, and 5,400,000 bales of wool were appraised for shipment to Britain. In addition, New Zealand supplied £39,500,000 worth of foodstuffs to the United States. At the same time our lactories manufactured large quantities of clothing, munitions and • equipment and supplied the civilian market with essential commodities which we were no longer able to obtain from overseas. The value of our factory production rose from £114,447,000 in 1933-39 to £174,500,000 in 1943-44. M These results could be obtained only by thorough and far-reaching organisation of New Zealand’s economy. Farm and factory production could only have been increased if our military commitments were to be fulfilled by the utilisation of all available manpower. The results of the Manpower Begulations, introduced in 1942, have certainly justified their introduction. •‘The Government’s wartime policy has adso met with striking success in Qfcfier directions. The stabilisation policy has been effectively applied and the extent to which the community has benefited cannot be exaggerated. PROSPEROUS AS NEVER BEFORE. “The country has emerged from the war as prosperous as never before and its financial structure is sound. The policy of paying for the war out of taxation as far as possible, and confining borrowing to the internal market, has met with marked success. During the last six financial years the total revenue raised.by the Government, excluding Lend-Lease and Mutual Aid, was £780,000,000. Taxation supplied £471,000,000, or 60 per cent of the total. Loans amounted to £260,000,00 and other revenue provided £49,000,000. Of the net borrowing only £3,000,030 came from overseas, for though a debt of £19,000,000 was incurred to the United Kingdom Government under the memorandum of security agreement, it was almost entirely offset by the of £16,000,000 of prewar debt.”

Mr. Fraser thanked all New Zealanders who had contributed to the success of the country’s war effort. Practically every person in New Zealand, he said, had helped in whatever way was open to him or to her.

Since the end of the war with Japan, 38,000 men and women had been released from the Forces, said Mr. Fraser. He gave an assurance that the release of the remainder of those coming out of the Forces would be carried out as rapidly as circumstances would allow. “No effort is being spared to secure the return of the men from overseas as soon as possible,” Mr. Fraser said. “The chief obstacle is the difficulty in obtaining shipping. In spite of this difficulty, however, some 23,C00 men have been brought back from overseas since Japan surrendered in August. “Good progress has been made in the work of assisting our exservicemen in their return to civil life. The Government early realised the importance of this task and as a result of measures taken early in the war, the Rehabilitation Department is well equipped to deal with the large numbers of servicemen being released from the Forces. Every effort is made to eliminate delays and administrative decentralisation has enabled applications for assistance to be dealt with very much more rapidly. So far more than £16.000,003 has been spent on the rehabilitation of our exservicemeiff Trade training schemes have given ex-servicemen the opportunity of learning skilled trades and have already provided hundreds of tradesmen so urgently needed for house construction work. The responsibility cf assisting ex-servicemen to find suitable employment has been assumed by the newly-formed Employment Department.”