AUSTRALIAN PROPOSAL

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 79, 9 February 1944, Page 5

AUSTRALIAN PROPOSAL

STATE PARTICIPATION IN INDUSTRY WARM DEBATE EXPECTED Sydney, Feb. 8. Proposals for the Australian Government's participation in industry on a commercial basis after the war have been endorsed by the Prime Minister, Mr Curtin. The matter is likely to be warmly debated when the Bill to authorise a referendum on extra postwar Commonwealth powers comes before the new session of the Federal Parliament. Though the Prime Minister said there was no fixed Government policy on participation in industry, he added: "It is just a broad question of how best to use the nation's assets. I don’t think they should be sacrificed by being knocked down to some bidder at a bargain sale ” Mr Curtin was commenting on a statement made yesterday by the Minister of Munitions, Mr Makin, that the Commonwealth should give wider postwar powers so it could enter industry to maintain Government munition plants valued at £100,000,000 on an efficient basis. Mr Makin’s statement has already roused considerable controversy. The Leader of the Opposition, Mr Menzies, has commented : "The Government is apparently to become a highly favoured competitor in the business world. Mr Makin’s statement is most revealing. While the Attorney-General, Dr. Evatt, is earnestly explaining that the proposed powers are really designed to provide justice for returned members of the fighting services, and that our fears about socialisation are groundless, Mr Makin comes out with a Jack Blunt proposition that these powers will enable the Government to use for trade purposes its munition factories which have been largely paid for by those many thousands of taxpayers who are engaged in private enterprise.” Mr Makin has replied that apparently Mr Menzies would “sell out for a song” the enormously valuable assets created by the Commonwealth during the war in the munitions industries, just as after the last war vested interests had succeeded in gaining control of the Australian shipbuilding industry and of the Commonwealth Shipping Line. The Minister said hi s statement had nothing to do with the general question of nationalisation. He had merely insisted that the munitions potential should not be dissipated as it was after the last war.

Among the items which have been suggested for post-war manufacture by Government munitions factories have been hot and cold-water services, plumbing, doors, windows, refrigerators, washing machines, vacuum cleaners, and other household electrical equipment and farming machinery. It has also been suggested that plants might be even more widely used to implement a gigantic scheme for the prefabrication of houses.—P.A. Special Australian Correspondent.