THE TRADES CONFERENCE SPEAKS. More Taxation for the Other Fellow.

Free Lance, Volume II, Issue 92, 5 April 1902, Page 8

THE TRADES CONFERENCE SPEAKS. More Taxation for the Other Fellow.

THK Tiades and Laboui Councils' Conference opened at Auckland on All Fools' Day, and lost no time in manifesting its bieadth of Mew and un.selfishne.ss of puipose. After electing a Chairman and Secretary it straightway proceeded to shape an mipro\ed fiscal policy tor the colony. Mr. Naughton, who U presumably the gentleman who holds a billet in the Government bookbinding department, and has also also been acting as Piesident of the Wellington Trades and Labour Council, rushed down to the footlights with a motion to inciease the land tax, abolish the exemption, and at the same time correspondingly reduce the duties on the necessaries of life. In other words, he was going to play the good old game of "Beggar my Neighbour" for all it was worth. IT * » It is this sort of greedy, squint-eyed spirit which disgusts so many people with the trades unionist leaders. They seem utterly incapable of looking at public questions from any other vieAV point than their own. And they appear to consider that the burdens of government must be piled up on all other backs but theirs. Mr. Naughton's proposal was the quintessence of selfishness. It would hit, in a double sense, the hardest grafter in this colony — the poor struggling backblocks settler, who toils from early dawn to bedtime, amid all sorts of privations, for a bare subsistence. To abolish the land tax exemption would at once bring him under the incidence of the tax, and to increase the tax itself would make unwelcome inroads upon his already slender revenue. And what is the object of this innoa ation '? To enable the privileged artisan of the big towns, who woz'ks no more than eight hours a day, enjoys a half -holiday on Saturdays, whose wages are regular and defined by Arbitration Court award, and who shares all the privileges and comeniences of urban life, to escape his proper modicum of Customs taxation, and let his country brother pay up for him. ■*■ * ♦ Howe\ er, the Conference wasn't quite ripe for Mr. Naughton's artless little proposal. It adopted instead an amendment in favour of an increase of the land and income tax, and a coincident reduction of the duties on those necessaries of life which cannot be produced in the colony. There is a \ aviation ot terms, and a difference in degree, but the animating principle of both proposals is the same. That principle is pure selfishness. There is no use mincing phrases. The trades unionist wants to share all the privileges ot the country without contributing to the expense. That 1= the plain English of it. * • * , If the land and income tax is to be increased so as to cheapen the duties on the necessaries of life, then let the extra burden be fairly adjusted to the shoulders of the community. At present 6d in the £ income tax is le\ied upon all incomes o\er £300. It is a very substantial impost. If theie is to be equality of sacrifice why not ha\e a sliding scale, and levy, say 8d in the £, on incomes between £200 and £300, and Id in the £ between £150 and £200, and make a commensurate reduction in the necessaries ot life ? But these large-minded and big-souled unionists only believe in direct taxation for the other fellow. They are to be dead -headed in this happy country while somebody else faces the music and pays the piper. That is the meaning of it. So far, their resolutions have not the force of law. If they did New Zealand would be a firstclass place to get out of.