NOTES AND COMMENTS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22183, 9 August 1935, Page 10

NOTES AND COMMENTS

CHILDREN AND ROAD SAFETY Views on how best to protect children against traffic dangers are being presented by vnrious authorities to the British Committee on Road Safety among school children. At a recent sitting of tho Association of Education Committees it was emphasised that all the aids which were introduced in tho schools or on the highways could in the main only bo directed toward one end—the instilling of a road-danger sense which, by systematic training, would become automatic. It was. recommended that the teaching of tho principles of "safety first" should be encouraged in all schools, and should not bo confined to road dangers, on definite standardised, continuous and systematic lines, especially in the early years. In the majority of cases education authorities favoured incidental training; others insisted upon definite lessons at stated intervals. When schools wore equipped with film projectors a great opportunity would arise for demonstrating through the medium of special films tho dangers of the highway and how to avoid them. EARL BEATTY ON THE NAVY t Speaking in the House of Lords on tho Anglo-German naval agreement, Earl Beatty said he was distressed and disturbed at the situation that existed to-day. The Navy was not strong enough to guaranteo tho safety of British seaborne trade because Britain was bound by treaties. She had been shackled ever since the London Treaty was signed. Serious deficiencies in the Navy had accumulated over a long period of years. Tho money now being swallowed up in making good these deficiencies -was money that should havo been applied to the building of more destroyers. Speaking generally, he welcomed the® German naval agreement. Britain owed a debt of gratitude to Germany in this respect. If Germany had suggested 50 per cent Britain could not have stopped her. He maintained that a gesturo of that kind did away definitely and completely with all possibility of rivalry on the sea between our two countries. This agreement did not limit the number of vessels Britain possessed and it did not prevent her from building any number she liked. But it did ensure that there would be no competitive building programmes between Britain and at least one country, in the world, and that was something to be thankful for. BRITISH FARM "OLICY Discussing the marketing schemes of tho British Minister of Agriculture, Mr. Walter Elliot, the Times argues that these are in tho nature of stopgaps and experiments. But, continues tho Times, the really constructive development of policy is still to come. The tariff system foreshadowed must be a low tariff system, and the interim subsidy system must be a small subsidy system, if the country as a whole is not to weary of the task to which it has set its hand. The country would never endure a great increase in food prices, caused by inefficiency and profiteering, or by both, on the part either of producers or of retailers; nor the mulcting of tho general taxpayer for tho benefit of those who do not deserve assistance. It may well be true that, owing to ineradicable differences in tho conditions of production, some British products could never compete on equal terms with some products from overseas. But that is no reason for not making the difference between the nrices at which British and other produce can be sold as small as efficient production and distribution can make it, nor any reason for failing to study how an increase in the consumption of food can steady and expand markets. JAPANESE SHORTCOMING Japanese history is sprinkled with examples of a sublime ability to disobey. says Mr. Upton Closo, in his new book. "Behind tho Face of Japan." He adds that reverence for authority and individual initiative exist in proportion, making a formidable leadership toward world conquest. Here he is open to challenge, remarks sir Frederick Whyte, writing in the If this thesis were true, Japan might indeed emulate Rome and England in Imperial destiny. But, is it true? In the supreme mpdern test of individual quality in a crisis—namely, in the air —the Japanese fall short. They are capable of great feats of courage, endurance and fortitude. Self-immolation and sacrifice at the bidding of an almost spiritual motive is their second nature; but there are inexorable limits in the Japanese character to this heroic nonconformity, which Mr. 'Close discovers in them, and tho true individualist will ask whether the picture ho gives of individualist and nonconformist Japan is correctly drawn. This doubt introduces a factor of disconcerting, not to say disabling, uncertainty regarding the future of Japan's self-appointed mission. Compared with any of the great nations of the modern world Japan has never had to face supreme danger or supreme destiny. When she does, it will be time enough to say that she has the innate power to survive. PEACE AND "PACIFISM" * Under tho above heading, the Times recently addressed some plain words to tho breed of pacifists who objected to tho organisation of Officers' Training Corps, Boy Scouts and Church Lads' Brigades, because they "inculcated tho military spirit." The Times said:— Tho conception of discipline presented by an annual camp or jamboree or a public schools' field day is as remote as it could well bo from that worship of force which "anti-militarists" have imported from abroad for their own purposes and seek to fasten upon a perfectly healthy activity with a. normal and necessary place in education. The whole campaign of the small, but pertinacious, cohort which has chosen to inscribe "holier than thou" upon its banner rests upon a fiction of its own inventing. It is tho more mischievous because, while it bickers about things which have no importance and no relovanco to the organisation of peace, it impedes or distracts a steady aid united vision of the real goal. It is an offshoot of tho belief that selfrighteous gesticulation in one country will somehow mesmerise tho unheeding Continent or tho still leas impressionablo East. Tho belief is notably held by persons in whom tho emotions have usurped tho seat of tho intelligence. They compensate their impatience with the difficulties and delays of true peacemaking by contriving and chastising figments of militarism at home. Thus they provide a comfortable outlet for hearts which, whatever their capacity for sound or foam, are certainly too full for sense.