PROBLEMS AHEAD.

Northern Advocate, 15 August 1919, Page 6

PROBLEMS AHEAD.

WHAT MR MASSEY THINKS,

MAKING UP LEEWAY

In the course of his speech at the ■ laying of the foundation stone of i the new State Fire Insurance build-; ing in Wellington, Mr Massey referred to some of the problems which had to be faced now that we had got over the war period. The building of which the Hon. Mr Mac Donald had just laid the foundation-sitone Was only one of those which had had to stand over because of the war. There wer c hundreds of school buildings which had to be erected, and he hoped would be taken in hand. We did not feel the want of them so much in the centres of population, but in many of the country districts the sch<p>is had been housed in tents. The matter would have to be taken in hand, and he thought there would be no difficulty in regard to finding the money for schools and other necessary public buildings. (Applause). But we had other difficulties to face though not so serious as those of other British countries. We had, however, got a splendid country, a productive country, and a splendid climate. THE POSSIBILITIES OF PRODUCTION in the Dominion had been proved during the war period by the enormous quantities of produce which we had -been able to send to the other side of the world—mostly for the Imperial Government, and for the use of ou r soldiers. But we could not stay where we were. We had undertaken •enormous liabilities. Our war debt amounted to practically £100,000,000, which, with the pre-war debt, made a total of £200,000,000; and we had got to increase our production in every way possible if we were going to carry that burden without serious inconvenience to our population. We could increase our production, he had no doubt; but we must face the position with the same

ENERGY AND DETERMINATION as we had faced the difficulties of the war period. (Applause). We had the hydro-electric schemes to develop; and he hoped 'that in the not far distant future they would be com-, pleted, to the great benefit of Wellington and other centres. (Applause.) We had also to complete our railways and road the country, and do all we could in connection with the soldier-settlement. He was glad to recognise the splendid work in that direction which his colleagues had done during his absence. We had to increase production and keep down UNNECESSARY EXPENDITURE. Those were the two things w e had to do. He said "unnecessary expenditure," because we could not increase production without increasing expenditure; and it was necessary to increase our exports by at least 50 per cent. He hoped that the shipping interests, though most of the ships trading out here were owned by overseas capital, would rise to the occasion and supply us with the necessary ships to take our produce to the markets of the world. • That was one of the most important items that we had to consider and arrange at th c present time; for we had seven millions' worth of frozen meat in store, besides butter, cheese, flax, wool, etc. All of this we wanted to turn into money, which, he claimed, would not remain in the pockets of the producers, but would filter through to all sections of the community. (Applause).