THE OPEN COLUMN.

New Zealand Times, Volume LXX, Issue 3825, 22 August 1899, Page 3

THE OPEN COLUMN.

DOWNRIGHT CRIMINALITY. “ Sensorium ” writes : —The suicidal rejection of tne entire loan proposals foi the betterment of the city and tutuie generations is one more folly added to" a number of others in the guidance of municipal affairs ; for from the day Wellington was first founded it cannot be raised out of the boggy ruts that have carrel its progress. The property-owners have been totally unmindful of the citizens’ mosr urgent behests and the city’s best interests, thus leaving the boasted “ suprenta a situ” laps behind other colonial towns. Nature has endowed Wellington with a noble site for an immense extension of trade, and the nurture of a vast, healthy population; but- folly, blindfolded folly, and crassly selfish ignorance, have stepped in to militate against the well-being, prosperity and health of citizens by refusing the removal of the foul diseases chat mankind is subject to, for lack of wellappointed recreation grounds, sanitary abattoirs, bathing sanatoriums, and the most important of all for pure air, vitality, and longevity, viz.—the establishment of an up-to-date crematorium.

FREEHOLD ,v. LEASEHOLD. Mr Geo. Wilks, Levin, writes;—Your limited space precludes me replying to ali Mr John .Lawson has written, but ne asks me who provides the money and pays interest thereon for roads? Everyoocly but single tax cranks will say the settlers. Again, Mr Lawson says; “The principle of taxing the unearned increment is a sound one;” so the late Henry George said, so the late Hon Mr.Ballance said, and so say all the blind followers of the above. But taxation to be just and fair, must be levied min mathematical precision. The income tax can be so levied. But can anyone, or all combined, of the frothy platform orators, say what is —e unearned increment of any single section of land, say, at Karori, or at anj' other place in the colony P It would take a Government actuary at least a week to get at even a proximate idea of the unearned increment of even one section of land, and then he could not ■ say how much the value of the land was raised by ocean facilities for transport, etc. The whole of bur legislation since 1890 that has been based on crude ideas of unearned increment, etc., is already proving unworkable, and cannot but fail eventually. Our wizards of finance have been, in verity, jugglers, i.e., making the unthinking public believe that fiction is the very truth. THE SALVATION ARMY AND PAUPERISM. Mr Whiting thinks (writes Mr D. O’Brien) that the. Army is above criticism. Let the public judge from the following facts: —They get land, houses, clothing, wood, etc., free; they get able-bodied men and women off the streets and from the gaols; they run laundries, wood and coal yards, uining-rooins, shops and factories: and though they sell their products in opposition to employers who pay wages, they give no money to their skies. Last year they cleared i‘3oo profit from the laundry alone; yet they never re-: turned a share to the unfortunate women who did all the work. If all the holies are more than self-sunnorting, and they get thousands of pounds every year by collections—what becomes of rue money ? Their

principle is give nothing for nothing. They will not take any sick, infirm or wounded persons into their homes; none hut workers wanted there, and when the inmates leave, having no means of support. they are arrested ns vagrants.