EQUALITY OF SACRIFICE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26114, 29 March 1946, Page 9

EQUALITY OF SACRIFICE

Sir,—May I comment on the proposal of Mr Begg that a straight-out gift of £40,000,000 be made by the Dominion Government to the British Government as “ some financial help to the hardpressed Motherland ”? With all due respect for the public-spirited proposal of Mr Begg, I fail to see any possibility of a fraction of that £40,000,000 conferring the slightest benefit on the suffering people of the Homeland. And a collective act of sacrifice of something we, as individuals, have never possessed seems to me a cheap and vicarous sacrifice indeed. The cry of the people is for food, and we stand hesitant as to whether we will take the risk of losing a few shillings per bushel by growing the wheat or other cereal they are begging us to produce. They ask us for bread, and we offer them the cold charity of a reduction of their debt. The credit fund that the statesmanship of Mr Nash and the policy of the Labour Party has built up is faced with the task of meeting the heavy responsibilities of the aftermath of the war. The Government has announced its determination and ability to solve the problem of unemployment by the use of the public credit, and not one penny of credit funds should be trenched on until every serviceman and woman, every widow and orphan who in greater or less degree are as much victims of war as those of other lands—has been provided for Our promises to them have to be fully redeemed, not as in the boom and slump aftermath of Ihe Great War, when land speculation for soldier settlement at boom prices resulted in losses of millions in value to soldier settlers and the Dominion, with the sequel of unemployment and camps for ex-servicemen, working as road-makers for 10s per day and rations as navvies. I am sure no decent man desires to see a renewal of such conditions, and therefore the slogan should be “ Hands off the Government's overseas credits.” In the meantime, the preparation of the land for wheat is still ample for those who are willing.—l am, etc.. W. D. Mason. Middlemarch. March 27.