FINANCE AND ELECTIONS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVII, Issue 17594, 6 October 1920, Page 7

FINANCE AND ELECTIONS.

[from ovs. own

SYDNEY, Sept. 21.

The Queensland general elections are j fixed to take place on October 9. It is believed that the chances are in favour of the return of the somewhat extreme Labour Party to • power, in spite of its very bad record of the past three years. When the election was* being fought in 1915 the Labour Government had a better record financially, being able to point to three successive surpluses, and Mr. E. G. Theodore, then Treasurer, made a ' good electioneering phrase when he declared that "finance is the test of good govern- ; ment." The anti-Labour forces are now very cruelly using this against him. It is a fact that in the three years subsequent to Mr. Theodore's declaration in 1915 the Labour Government has recorded three large £253,500, £409,500, and £172,000. It claims a small surplus this year, but the figures have not yet been passed by the Auditor-General. Mr. Theodore, now Premier, is doing his best to meet a flood of hostile comment; but he is obviously finding nothing harder to combat than the' logic of his famous phrase. The Queensland producers have organised, and there are to be three parties in the election, as was the case in the recent Federal and New South Wales elections— National, Labour, and Farmers. The only connection between the Farmers and the Nationalists is their hostility to the Labour Party. The Farmers will probably win a good number of seats from the Nationalists, but there is nothing to indicate that a sufficient number of Nationalists and Farmers will be returned to put the extremists out of office. The Queensland National Party, for a long time past, has been very weak in leadership, and it does not appear to be very well organised. The Nationalists claim that the election is being fought on two issues—repudiation &nd finance. It is said that the Labour Government has been guilty of three acts of repudiation, which have damaged the reputation of the State. First, after lessees and financiers had been induced to invest in ' the Queensland pastoral industry by which the industry was made to flourish, the Labour Government altered the law and made a fundamental change in the rental system, which vitally affected the whole of the financial interests in the pastoral industry. Second, the Government passod a law over-riding the arrangement under which a London company had been induced to establish and carry on a tramway system in Brisbane, so that the value of the whole property was depreciated just before it became due to be taken ever by the Queensland authorities. Third, it amended its income tax laws so that a levy might be made on incomes derived from State stock that had been sold as free from income tax. So far as finance is concerned the figures already quoted are the chief argument of the Nationalists. But along with those deficits they are putting the taxation per head of the people. It was £1 7s 2d in 1913-14, and £4 16s 6d in 191920. It is well known that the Queensland Government, on account of its recent legislation was recently refused money in London. The Premier, as an election cry, is asking "Shall we be ruled by the London capitalists V-