NECESSARY ADJUSTMENTS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22609, 28 June 1935, Page 14

NECESSARY ADJUSTMENTS

TO THE EDITOR

Sib,—ln a letter by Mr E. Oswald Reilly appearing in your issue of to-day he states, inter alia. "I think that the unemployed man receiving a wage of 10s 6d per day, irrespective of the work he does, has had during the hard times, quite generous treatment." _ He goes on to refer to "maintaining in many instances undeserving men in work." The trouble seems to be that thet city councillors intend to divert £32,000 from reserves towards the payment of wages to relief workers. Now, when the Government is spending many thousands of pounds on the expenses of the various members who are tripping round the world (at our expense], not a word is raised in protest. When Mr H. Sterling, who, I believe, receives £2OOO per annum superannuation and' also holds down a job at £IOOO a year, leaves his work to be done by his subordinates and takes a trip round the world, drawing his £3OOO all the time, nothing is said, but when there is. a suggestion of appropriating £32,000 to be paid in wages—which will in turn be spent in the city and so find its way back to the pockets of the ratepayers — Mr Eeilly and others (including the Otago Daily Times) are up in arms and suggest that there will be all sorts of unpleasant consequences. The Prince of Wales in a speech last year said: "If all the employable labour were employed for a reasonable number of hours per week, the world would have at its disposal a volume of commodities and service that would enable the entire population to live on a higher level of comfort and well-being than has ever been contemplated in the .rosiest dreams of the social reformers. The urgent task for the world is to bring about the adjustments necessary to bring consumption and production into proper relationship." It seems pretty obvious that until the rank and file have sufficient to spend on the necessaries of life there can be no real improvement in trade. The more money that is spent the more goods will be consumed, and the -more will be required to be produced. On the other

hand, the less they have to spend the less goods will be sold, and so on. The superior attitude adopted by some people towards " the unemployed," as though they were some lower order of animal, is absolutely out of place in these times. I thought that sort of snobbery was washed out during the war. Money does not make the man —nor does the man who possesses the largest amount necessarily have most intelligence. We cannot all be in secure jobs like civil servants, nor can we all have well-established businesses; but even the work of the labourer is necessary for the wellbeing of the whole community, and should be recognised as such. Although I am of opinion that " party politics" is a wrong principle, the Labour Party appears to bo the only section of the community which realises that in this world of plenty all workers are entitled to participate and receive adequate remuneration for their labour. For 2000 years we have been asking, "Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven," and it seems to me that that time will be hastened when we elect a Government (whether municipal or parliamentary) which hag for its programme the task advocated by the Prince of Wales, of " bringing about the adjustments necessary to bring consumption and production into proper relationship."—l am, etc., H. A. S. June 24.