The New Zealand Herald AUCKLAND, TUESDAY, AUGUST 21, 1945 V-P DAY FAILURE

New Zealand Herald, Volume 82, Issue 25286, 21 August 1945, Page 4

The New Zealand Herald AUCKLAND, TUESDAY, AUGUST 21, 1945 V-P DAY FAILURE

The behaviour of a section of Auckland's youth during the victory celebrations prompted some serious reflections. Conduct which pained unnecessai'ily those who have brought victory at the price of happiness was in itself deplorable. The presence in the community of the disorderly minority, which took the too-easily granted opportunity to reveal itself, is a matter of still more sober concern. It is necessary, of course, to maintain a true perspective. While a few hundred hooligans fouled a city street, thousands of their worthier contemporaries spent the day otherwise elsewhere, more healthily and becomingly. Against the feckless boys and girls who stirred last week's contempt must be set the memory of youthful soldiery. Those . who marched with the Eighth Army lacked none of the ancient vigour of the race. The "ball of fire" was compact of courage and endurance. No men, since the troubadours first sang of chivalry, have been more brave than those who fought the battle of the air, and took New Zealand's name across infested seas. It is ironical that pride in such representatives should be coldly dashed by the revelation at the lower end of the scale of the recent indiscipline and irresponsibility. At the same time, the Auckland community as a whole, and particularly its leaders in their various degrees and most older folk, must accept a large share of the blame for what occurred. The civic authorities had ample warning after V-E Day of what was likely to happen when YrP Day arrived. They did nothing to forestall it except arrange for bands to play in the streets on the first afternoon—an experiment which had to be abandoned when rowdies began throwing bottles near the musicians. Events were left to take their course until the senior magistrate, after making an inspection, used his authority to check the sale of beer in bottles. Broadly speaking, middle-aged people, after the first few hours of rejoicing, went home and left youth in possession of: the streets. This, it must be admitted, showed a lack in Auckland of a proper community spirit. Christchurch did better. On the first afternoon a great thanksgiving service was held in a park, and on the second day—as previously in Maythere was a street procession in which thousands took part while thousands more watched and cheered. Responsibility for Auckland's failure to organise corporate rejoicing must rest not only on the city municipality, but also on social and other organisations which could have assisted and which should have forced the hand of the city fathers. If the latter had been able to rely on the co-operation of the armed forces in a grand parade everything would have been much easier, but there the Government failed. None of these things was done and the. young people, who wanted a lead from their elders, were left to their own devices and got into mischief —a minority into hooliganism. That is not to exonerate them. Other reasons should be sought and stated. An unnatural scarcity of labour over the period of the war has created conditions for thousands of young workers which cannot continue in normal employment. Money too easily earned is too often harmfully spent, and authority has been too preoccupied or too unwise to devise some safeguard. It should have been easy to sequester excessive earnings for later and more economic spending. Responsible journals and social organisations have more than once made the suggestion. Dean Inge has deplored the fact that larger wages come only with later years when their use is past. Here was an opportunity to protect a prosperous generation of young people from the prodigalities of youth, to preserve its resources for its own home-making and to check inflation. Natural common sense has come to the rescue of many, but in the course of human nature it is to be feared that many young men and women have been taught too early to spend and to depend. There is also the fact that thousands who have missed the training of the armed forces have been poorly taught the social virtues. Children have passed through their 'teens with parents absent on service or engaged for long hours. Many able and virile schoolteachers have been lost to the classroom. Some damage was inevitable. It remains to be remedied. If the Youth Scheme is to be revived the Government, in collaboration with Church and school authorities, should devise some means of checking a tendency, and reaching the hooligan tenth. The schools should see to it that the infection spreads no further. The syllabus may change. School method may alter. Discipline, courtesy, respect for the rights of others and honest work should never be regarded as less than prime essentials. WAR OVER : COSTS HIGHER In anticipation of the war against Japan continuing into next year and New Zealand continuing to do her part, Mr Nash demanded £105,000,000 for the War Expenses Account. Parliament cut the armed forces by 45 per cent. That had no effect on Mr Nash's estimates. They remained at £105,000,000. Then the war collapsed. Mr Nash promptly withdrew the estimates for revision. He is resubmitting them to Parliament with an increase of no less than £34,000,000. It is to cost more to end the war than to fight it. Not all the specious reasoning and figuring of Mr Nash will convince ordinary mortals there is sense in that. A full year of fighting was to absorb £30,000,000 in pay and allowances. Before the end of the financial year the three services will have been reduced nearly to vanishing point, but their pay and allowances will cost £4,000,000 more. An additional

£450,000 is required for the accommodation, food and clothing of forces already in process of demobilisation. War and other stores needed to carry the battle to the enemy were to have cost £21,000,000. There is no longer an enemy to light, but the bill for these items is to be raised by nearly £1,000,000. So it goes on. The wear and tear of active service called for £1,100,000 for maintenance and repairs. The charge for the first months of peace will be £300,000 more. An increase in transport charges to bring the men home is to be expected, but when they are home surely more than an additional million pounds will be needed for rehabilitation. Mr Nash's talk of having.to provide for the three months' leave of the men from overseas and their deferred pay is unconvincing, Had the war gone on they would have been paid out of the original £105,000,000. The deferred •pay should long ago have gone to charge. And why appropriate this year the full amount of £18,000,000 for the gratuity, which Mr Nash repeats is to be paid only over a period ? If Mr Nash's own party supporters and the Opposition are alive to their responsibilities they will challenge him on nearly every item in his revised estimates. They will point out to him that a considerable time before the end of the financial year ho will be quit of most of his heavier war costs, but that the national security tax and the wartime sales tax will go on for another calendar year from this moment. That Is 6d in the pound and the sales tax hurt the wage-earner more than anything else. It is useless for Mr Nash to talk of Budget relief next year "that industry may be given that scope and impetus to reorganisation and development so essential to provide worthwhile permanent employment in industry for our men and women coming out of the armed forces. The scope and impetus should be given now, so that the jobs will be waiting for the men and women when they are demobilised. If industry has to wait until toward the end of next year before it is allowed the use of its own earnings for development many ex-servicemen will be long looking for jobs. Mr Nash's revised estimates make a mock of the people. If he will not prune them, the task must be undertaken by the House. Mr Nash does not state how he proposes to raise the additional £34,000,000 _he says will be required. Does he intend to ask for a second Victory Loan, or to impose more taxation 1 Or does he privately share the public conviction that his revised estimates have no real basis and therefore need not be financed 1 Once again the House should demand a frank and true accounting.