NOTES AND COMMENTS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22743, 1 June 1937, Page 8

NOTES AND COMMENTS

EMPIRE UNITED FOR PEACE

BRITISH FARMING POLICY

Sir Thomas Inskip, Minister for the Co-ordination of Defence, speaking in London, said that, apart from their common allegiance to the Crown, there was another bond which the nations of the Empire were bound to recognise, whether it was welcome or not —the common danger which was apparent to them all. "To-day," he continued, "the British Commonwealth is the centre and core of such security as the world possesses. It is indeed a world-wide organisation of peace, and it is for that purpose alone that all parts of the Empire are to-day setting their house in order. The Dominions to-day arc not less aware than we are of this necessity, and are taking | preparatory measures. We gladly recognise that it is not a task that we should force upon them, or even propose to them." I UNRAVELLING THE KNOTS "Ten million weeks a year are lost to industry from nervous illness," said Mr. R. S. Hudson, Parliamentary Secretary to the British Ministry of Health, speaking at the annual luncheon of the Tavistock Clinic, the Institute of Medical Psychology. Dr. •I. R. Rees, medical director of the institute, said that the clinic was trying to unravel the knots of nervous troubles. "The only kind of radical treatment," he added, "is to try to do something comparable to surgery, to get at the root of the trouble and clean it up." A London magistrate, said Dr. Rees. had told him that he had never had a single patient on probation back before him in Court after psycho-therapic treatment at the clinic. About 55 per cent were permanently relieved. A DANE -SEES ENGLAND " lhe first thing in Kngland that must strike every true Dane is the appearance of the countryside—the endless expanse of green pasture, broken now and then by smudges of poor cultivation," said a Dane in a 8.8.C. broadcast on his impressions of Kngland. " \\e are used to a landscape broken up in different sized neat patches of yellow, brown and green. Kvery strip of land is used. I enjov the beauty of the Knglish countryside, but my Danish instincts revolt against the tremendous waste of good land. For some time 1 could not find where the actual farms were in Kngland. until 1 suddenly realised that the fine living houses with the miserable sheds and buildings round them were the farms. In Denmark it is often the other way round; the outbuildings are nice elaborate than the living quarters." THE WAY OF HEALTH "I have never, like some folk, regarded the way of health as a sort of tight-rojj,?, along which we make a slow and trepidating progress—the least bias to this or that side not immediately corrected, or corrected too slowly, and we plunge headlong into the abyss," said Lord Horder, physician to the King, in a recent broadcast. "Health is a broad and wellpaved road. Now and again there are bends that call for some care. There are cross-roads where we must slow down. There is a goodly sprinkling of fools travelling. Pace carries risks of a special kind. But the amount of negotiation needed isn't great. The whole business lies in keeping control of the car. There is really no mystery about health. It isn't masonic. The man who talks about the 'secrets of good health' is either a crank or he has something to sell. Of course, we must have some zest for life. We must be convinced that it is better being well than ill. And in the midst of so many temptations these days to let our health drift we must take a few pains to be fit, and more pains than our fathers had to take. But it is really worth doing; it is a duty that we owe to our country and to ourselves."

An outline of an agricultural policy which, it is urged, the Government should follow, is contained in the report of a special committee of the Association of British Chambers of Commerce which was appointed to consider the position of British agriculture and industry. The report states that Great Britain, by her policy of opening up agricultural areas oversea and enabling her debtors to pay in goods and services, has helped herself to sell her manufactures abroad, her population to live better and more cheaply than ever before, but has for two generations exposed her farmers and agricultural landowners to fierce competition. This competition combined with the increase of population and spread of towns and tho steady improvement in output by agricultural workers has reduced her area of arable land and cultivated grass by two million acres, her men employed on farms by 500,000. When other nations by subsidies or restraints enable food to bo sold in Britain below cost the Government must, it is added, adopt methods to safeguard farmers from unnatural competition without depriving industry of a valuable gift. A low retail price of food has a double importance. British industry cannot afford to pay more than tho world's price for its prime raw material which is the food of its workers. Farmers here and abroad cannot afford to allow a high retail price to limit the consumption by whose growth and by no other agency agriculture can thrive. These considerations, and the need to prevent an unnecessary charge for retailing, should be borne in mind both in connection with agricultural policy and in connection with statutory marketing schemes designed to secure remunerative prices to the farmer. British agricultural policy should bo to keep the land fertile and in good heart as best suits tlie soil and climate of each farm, and the Government, within the frontier indicated, should hold itself free to use tariffs, or levy, or quota, or subsidies, or distributive control separately or in combination, remembering always tho dangers that threaten when it passes beyond the frontier and in the supposed interest of British agriculture restricts the supply or forces up the retail price of food to prices which restrict consumption.