PROTECTING INDUSTRY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22493, 10 August 1936, Page 8

PROTECTING INDUSTRY

" Whatever steps are necessary will be taken" to protect New ! Zealand manufacturers against competition from other countries with lower labour standards. This assurI ance has been repeated by the Prime j Minister, although he also says that Cabinet has not yet reached the subject of tariff revision. The quesj tion is whether protection in the j form of a stiffer tariff can be given !to secondary industry without serij ously prejudicing primary industry iin its export markets. That conj sideration must be kept in mind by i the Government, carefully, closely | and constantly. At the same time the manufacturers' claims cannot be denied. Their costs have been raised steeply by industrial laws requiring the payment of higher wages for shorter hours. These heavy new charges will have to be added to their prices, thus placing them at a disadvantage with importers. Unless they are to lose their market, they must be assisted in some way. Their concern is also the concern of the thousands of workers employed in factories and dependent on their success. How are these important interests to be reconciled with those of the export trade, which is at least as important? To find an answer to that question, to reconcile interests that appear irreconcilable, is one of the central problems of the Government. As it is, the labour interest has been given a flying start over the interests of primary and secondary industries. The Government has placed labour's claim a long way first. Can that position be maintained in face of the prior necessity of primary industry to hold its markets overseas, and of secondary industry to keep its footing in the domestic markets'? Mr. Savage cannot afford to delay the answer, because modern competition strikes quickly at any opening.