NOTES AND COMMENTS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22107, 13 May 1935, Page 8

NOTES AND COMMENTS

VOLUNTARY STERILISATION Support for the proposed legalising of voluntary sterilisation is expressed by the Bishop of Southwark, Dr. Parsons. Referring to the Brock Report on the subject, lie states: " The report urges that voluntary sterilisation should bo legalised in cases in which medical opinion is convinced that it is desirable. in order to prevent the birth of children who will, in all probability, inherit very serious mental and physical defects. Provided that the voluntary nature of the consent to be given is fully safeguarded, and that opportunity is secured to any patient concerned (or his legal guardian or representative), to seek advice from the religious body to which he belongs on the moral issues involved, I personally see no reason why the Church should oppose legislation on the lines proposed in the report."

MAGAZINE FICTION

The dangerous influence which the average magazine story is exerting on the minds of the public, was attacked by Mr. L. A. G. Strong, editor of Lovat Dickson's Magazine, when speaking to the English Association. "Its danger," he said, "lies in the fact that with the fairy-tale quality of these stories is mingled an appearance of reality. The physical circumstances of these stories resemble those of ordinary life, but the escape is contrived by ft falsification of values, a subordination of all other factors in the story to the consummation desired by the reader. Here is the danger. I want to fight with all my power against the idea that only bad art can be offered to the mass of the people. This belief holds more firmly in the sphere of the short story than any other. A good story will find its way into the popular magazines just as well as a bad one."

AUSTRALIA'S BIRTH-RATE

The Federal Minister for Health, Mr. W. M. Hughes, in an address to the Millions Club in Sydney, appealed to Australians to realise that the true progress of the nation depended upon an increased birth-rate. He said that if. this was disregarded the nation would be stagnant by 1968. Mr. Hughes disclosed that the King and Queen had expressed themselves to the Commonwealth Government as being eager to see success attend the maternal and infant jubilee memorial, Australia's gift to Their Majesties for their Silver Jubilee. Australia, he said, was at the gates of nations in the Far East, which had exhausted their food supplies and wanted others. If the Australian people were to hold their vast domain, they must justify their occupation of it bv occupying it adequately and developing it effectively. The stream of immigrant" had not only dried up during the last five years, but more people had gone out of Australia thaji had come into it. While the stream of migrants had ceased to flow, the rate of natural increase had fallen for some years. Last year it touched a new record low level.

AUSTRALIA AND THE EMPIRE

Australia's membership of the British Empire and the possibility of her becoming involved in quarrels, or even in war, arising out of European problems, made it imperative that Federal Ministers should form an intelligent opinion on those questions, that members of the Federal Parliament should know enough about those issues, and that there should be an intelligent public opinion, said Sir Thomas Bavin in a speech in Sydney. There never was a time when it was more important that Australians should interest themselves in and understand the vital issues of foreign policy. Alliances in Europe, if continued, would turn that continent into a powder magazine into which some knave or fool was certain to drop a match. The policy and action of the British Empire was of enormous importance. A mistake on the part of Britain might mean war, and if war came, Australia would be involved in it. The suggestion that any Dominion could remain neutral in a European war in which Britain was involved was pernicious and childish nonsense. Developments in the Pacific affected Australia even more directly and vitally. Scarcely one Australian in a hundred had any idea what the Washington treaties are, and what a critical situation has been created for Australia by Japan's denunciation of them.» Although he spoke in no spirit of hostility to Japan, or with any desire to attribute to her any unfriendly designs, the actions and words of the party now dominant in Japan made it clear that they wished to become the controlling force in Eastern Asia.

SOUTH AFRICAN WOOL

Mr. C. T. te Water, High Commissioner for South Africa, speaking at the annual dinner of the British Wool Federation in Bradford, referred to the anxiety felt in wool circles in Yorkshire about the wool agreement between the South African Government and the German Government. He said that the arrangement was nothing more than a clearance arrangement. It was simply an exchange agreement between the two countries, and it had nothing whatever to do with barter. It was merely a modus vivendi, whereby the bills payable in respect of normal business were collected into a pool in South Africa and utilised to finance German purchases of South African goods, and particularly of wool. No preference whatever was granted to the Germans in the agreement, and there was no alteration of the usual course of trade, except that South Africa had been compelled to mobilise her resources in order to receive payment for her goods. Kngland herself had her difficulties with respect to trade with Germany, and South Africa likewise had to solve her difficulties in the way that she found at the moment was fittest and best for South African farmers. He could only hope that thej were not so far away from a world recovery that those restrictions which were hampering trade recovery would pass. Mr te Water urged that it was highly desirable that Great Britain should taktf more South African goods, in view of the balance of trade between the two countries. Danger was likely to arise, ho said, from a. situation in which South Africa had to find a market for her surplus goods among foreigners, whose goods she would have to take in return for her raw products.