COST OF LIVING.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XLIV, Issue 14706, 5 June 1920, Page 1

COST OF LIVING.

(Per Kesi^issdciktion.) WJ3LLINGTOX. .June 4. A public iri-eeting, tailed by tho Returned 1 Soldiers' Association, considered the cost of living: Question, and passed several lengthy resolutions, including the following:—'[That this meeting believes that- the intolerable increase ill the cost of living is largely due to conditions that can be controlled by the Government-, and therefore calls upon Cabinet and Parliament to take immediate steps to reduce paper currency and to impose a levy on all war profits and grant by legislation, the right of duly authorised officers to inspect the invoices and books of any trader, so as to ensure immediate detwtion of any profiteering. "That this meeting caljs upon tho Government to control profits "by fixing a standard rate .of interest for each ■ class ojf business and industry; to reduce customs duties on necessaries of life and increase duties on certain luxuries; to cheapen by means of an export tax and. the control of prices tho cost oP butter and meat, and to place an export tax on wool. "Tliab the income tax on ■ companies and manufacturers of the necessaries of life be abolished, and that-a yearly bonus of at least £lO for each child be paid to families; having incomes under . £2so'per year." 1 Other resolutions called upon the Government to appoint- a. Minister i'or housing: to stop land aggregation and in create the land tax : to acquire com-' pulsorilv land suitable for settlement; to revalue all land for taxation purposes and to stop all speculative trafficking in land. The Jocal president of the Returned Soldiers'"Association said that the Association would take charge of the resolutions and press them persisterrtTv on tho attention of the Government.'