POVERTY AND FOOD

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22538, 1 October 1936, Page 15

POVERTY AND FOOD

Sir,' —I welcome the intimation that the members of the New Zealand Welfare League' wish to abolish poverty and give to the people the milk and other things they need; to this extent we are on common ground. It would appear that the league agrees that the present financial system is "the barrier." As the league has been, and is, such a strong advocate for the retention of orthodox finance I am. glad to accept their authoritative admission. The league repeats its question as to what the financial system shall be changed into. I must admit that this is outside my province. The league would have such change as is proposed submitted to the electors, so that they can have it looked into. The effect of the delay entailed by such a procedure would mean,.as I indicated in my previous letter, that our people must in the meantime continue to get ill and even die from want of food. I suggest that the league's proposal is to mistake tlie means for the end, and is far from being a common-sense proposal. It is on these grounds that I asked, and still ask, "Who is the New Zealand Welfare League and by what right does it say to our people, you may not live, and it is not material that you should be ill because no practical method can be found to prevent it." I repeat this quotation from my first letter because of the concluding portion of the league's letter in reply. In this I feel justified from the fact that they still make it a condition of feeding the people who are starving, that the workability of the financial change be first investigated. 1, on the contrary, require that the people shall be fed forthwith out of the abundance winch we know is in the country. Our people are hungry, we have "the food, and I claim that the. first charge upon our national resources should bo the feeding of our hungry people and not the payment of tribute to a financial system which is admittedly responsible for the crime of starving them. The present Government was elected on specific pledges involving the reform of our present financial system, so that our people could buy at economic prices their total production. To this end we were promised " a money service at cost." Thus the electors have already voted for a definite "change" in the financial system and were promised that such a change would ensure that the people would bo fed, housed and clothed. Therefore I submit that the present Government was given a definite mandate how to change the financial system so as to feed the people, and I have no reason to think that the Crown Law draughtsman is not capable of putting such a simple instruction into appro-, priate legislative form, whatever departmental change in our national life this legislation involves. The proposal of the league would appear to be tantamount to a retrial of election issues already decided. For these reason I claim an elector's right to demand of my member that ho fulfil his pledge to feed the people, and it would do to me a matter for regret if my failure or the failure of other electors so to remind him, were to jeopardise our member's return at the next election. E. B. Gunson.