NATIONAL PROBLEMS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20820, 12 March 1931, Page 10

NATIONAL PROBLEMS.

The programme outlined for the special session of Parliament will not include a Budget, a Public Works statement or any of the other formal documents in which the policy of the Government is usually expounded. In these circumstances, the speech prepared by the Government for delivery by the GovernorGeneral might well have been ma.de the medium ' for a comprehensive statement of the actual pi'oposals to be submitted instead of leaving them to be revealed piecemeal as the various emergency bills are produced. Apart from the vague and uninspiring character of its contents, the speech is as an attempt to create an entirely false conception of the situation which now confronts Parliament and the country. There are several passages suggesting that "the grave economic crisis" has only recently arisen, that the urgent necessity for rigid economy has only now become pressing and that the Government's proposals satisfy the demand for remedial measures promptly undertaken. These are absurd preterm sions. It. is only necessary to refer to the statement issued by,the Prime Minister on his assumption of the office nine months ago and to last year's Budget for confirmation of the fact that the Government long ago acknowledged the need for adjustment to "a substantial reduction in our national income," and has postponed action until further delay has become impossible. The fall in prices to which all present difficulties ai'e attributed was serious when Parliament met last year; it had proceeded much further before the end of the session, when the Government deliberately evaded all efforts to persuade it to institute i;emedial measures and even the accumulating evidence of acute derangement of the national finances was ignored so long that when action was at last taken it was too late to be of any practical value this year. The persistent failure of the Government to undertake a systematic plan of financial and economic reorganisation while there was still time for deliberate action has aggravated the difficulties confronting the country and there is now only time for drastic measures hastily devised and ruthlessly applied. Moreover, had the general effects of the depression been courageously and wisely faced as they developed, tho country would have been better fitted to cope with the earthquake calamity. Thus, the claim that the Government is acting promptly is unwarranted. i

RAILWAY CONSTRUCTION. An apparently ingenuous question addressed to the Prime Minister iu the House of Representatives yesterday gave Mr. Forbes an opportunity to proscribe any discussion during the present session of questions relating to railway construction. Members of Parliament who regard their responsibilities seriously are not likely to submit tamely to this ruling; in the public interest, they are bound to demand from the Government a clear statement of its intentions in this important matter. The N only information at present available is the statement issued in December announcing the immediate suspension of certain works and indicating the continuation of expenditure on others, including the hopelessly unprofitable South Island Main Trunk project-, which has been condemned in every part of the Dominion except the districts immediately interested, and even there support is half-hearted and based upon the flimsiest arguments. The Government cannot avoid the necessity of formulating a definite policy on this question unless it proposes that Parliament shall sanction the establishment of non-political control of railway operations without reference to responsibility for future extensions of the system and additions to the capital liability. The question will again demand attention when proposals in regard to the earthquake area are under consideration. If Parliament is asked to authorise special taxation _ and special borrowing for the repair of earthquake damage, it. should be given explicit assurances that expenditure in other directions will be curtailed. On the most conservative estimates of the loss, the earthquake has caused an enormous addition to our dead-weight debts, and the country cannot afford to add fresh burdens of debt and taxation by building railways for political purposes. The Prime Minister may prefer to deal with this question "in the ordinary way." That way of dealing with it has also resulted in the squandering of millions in the last few years, and the necessity for dealing with it in an exceptional way cannot be denied.