CHIEF PARTIES' POLICIES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20263, 24 May 1929, Page 11

CHIEF PARTIES' POLICIES.

STATEMENTS BY LEADERS.

UNEMPLOYMENT REMEDIES. LLOYD GEORGE'S CHALLENGE. The leaders of the three great political parties in Britain have expounded then policies for the guidance of the clectois and the chief plunks in their platfoims have been brought into prominence. The Conservatives' policy was announced by the J?rimo Minister, Mi. Baldwin on April 18 in a speech at the Drury Lane Theatre, London. lie declared it to be:—

" A policy of sobriety, of nursing our trade into better condition, of looking after the education and health of our people, and particularly of our women and our children. From end to end it is a policy which you know will be carried out to tho utmost of our ability, and T will promise nothing more." Mr. Baldwin reminded his audience that Disraeli was mocked at, but in two years he was returned to power with tho same majority tho present Conservative Party would get at the end of May, namely, 113. "Mr. Lloyd George," ho said, " has made a statement that tho Liberal Party is a party of promise. I accept that. I am not a competitor. That has for years been the dividing line between our great parties.

" We are performers, and while others are searching for policies to meet an emergency which is not likely to arise we have been immersed in the great struggle for years, and by the continuance of the policy in which we aro engaged we shall continue tho process that is now going on—that of conquering unemployment. Unemployment and Safeguarding. "So solid are the foundations upon which British industry now rests that 500,000 of the surplus of unemployed havo already been absorbed in industry, and I have every hope that the figures will shrink in time to normality. Our efforts will bo directed all the time, as they havo been, to getting men into permanent employment rather than using palliatives." Mr. Baldwin said the Government had been satisfied with tho result of safeguarding as a most valuable adjunct to producing permanent employment. He claimed that tho only pledge the Government had failed to carry out was in not having passed the Factory Bill. That was because the whole programme was thrown out by the general strike of 1926. The Factory Bill would be one of the first measures which the new Government, if in power, would pass.

Turning to the needs of agriculture Mr. Baldwin said the Government had gone straight ahead to try to reduce the overhead charges on the industry. He spoke of the importance to farmers of the marketing and grading of produce, and said that in Cornwall, as the result of grading, English broccoli had now penetrated into foreign markets. "Wo have decided," he added, " that during six months of the year, from October to March, beef for the British Army, Air Force and the Navv, when in home ports, shall all be British." Liborals and the Unemployed. Speaking at Manchester the Leader of the Liberal Party, Mr. Lloyd George, said the Liberals had every reason to bo gratified with the reception accorded by the nation as a whole to the. carefully thought out proposals for dealing with chronic unemployment. He could not say they had no critics, but lie could say that thev were putting forward their plan as a united party. The taunts of disunion in the party would have to be thrown into the waste-paper basket. \ The Labour Party could not make up its mind whether to treat the Liberal plan as a freak or to claim its paternity. Mr. Lloyd George added; "Mr. Thomas has said* I declared I cauld cure unemployment, I never said that. I said you could reduce unemployment to normal proportions in 12 months. A cure is a longer process. Our plan will help toward that cure. But there is a great deal more that will have to bo done. You will have to establish peace on firmer foundations in the world. You will have to cut down our extravagant drink bill. There must be a better organisation of industry with a view to arranging that certain orders can be taken in hand when employment is slack."

Mr. George denied having said that the plan would not cost a penny. What he had said was that it could be effected without adding one penny to local or national taxation. He proceeded: —"I am going to give a challenge to the Prime Minister. He has been 10 years in office; I have been 17. I ask him to pick any 10 out of mv 17 and compare them with his. Any 10—the first, the middle, or the last— Board of Trade, Exchequer, Munitions, Old Age Pensions—the saving of the credit of the nation from a panic at the beginning of tho war; the saving of our poor fellows in the trenches from being crushed by the superior armaments of a terrible foe; take them all. I am quite willing that any 10 years of bis should bo contrasted with mine from the point of view of hard work, of performance." Planks in Labour's Platform. Mr. Arthur Henderson, secretary of the Labour Party, in the course of a broadcast speech, said it was on public record that the highest and most responsible assembly of tho Labour Party had formally and specifically rejected the policy of tho non-voting of credits, that Labour stood for progressive disarmament by international agreement. Labour had not the remotest intention of depriving recipients of their war pensions or retired pay. Labour regarded unemployment as tho most urgent problem of the hour. Its policy was to provide work. It stood both for the right to work and the opportunity to woik. Tho Labour Government would at once take steps to establish diplomatic and commercial relations with Russia. It would retain children at school up to 15, with the necessary provision of maintenance allowances, and would provide more generous pensions in order to enable the aged workers who so desired to live in honourable retirement at a reasonable standard of life.

A Labour Government would sign the Optional Clause , and the General Act of Arbitration, Conciliation, and Judicial Settlement drafted by the Ninth Assembly of the League of Nations, and would resume its efforts of 1924 for the general and progressive reduction of armaments by international agreement.