LABOUR’S RULE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26290, 23 October 1946, Page 5

LABOUR’S RULE

Sir,—ln reply to your ex-soldier correspondent, W. N. Houghton, the writer would like to point out that he himself saw active service in the 1914-1918. war, though some rather prominent presentday Labour stalwarts did not, and also rendered service in the Home Guard and essential industry in this recent war, but the question of whether services of such kinds helped to save either your correspondent or the writer from having to wear chains has no bearing on the political issue. What concerns the writer much more is that, from information gathered in 1919 while conditions in the preceding war period were still fresh in public memory, he can say with assurance that under the competent management of the non-Labour Government of that time there had been few of the shortages and none of the rationings that have existed under the present incompetent Labour Government, while the measure of wartime personal freedom enjoyed by the people was very much greater. Further, the writer can personally vouch for the fact that when we were the same distance in time from the end of that war as we now are from the recent one, there were under the competent trade and economic policies of the non-Labour Government of that day neither shortages nor rationings of any sort, but an abundance of goods from many sources or supply purchasable without restrictions of any sort, and a greater measure of progress and real prosperity was in evidence than is the case to-day under Labour rule. Certainly the writer was no more appreciative of the slump-time conditions from 1930 onwards than your correspondent appears to be, hence his former support for Labour. However, in the light of the sort of conditions that the present Labour Government has been subjecting us to during the past six years, the writer no longer believes for one moment, despite all the “ ballyhoo that Labour members may indulge in during this election, that had this same Labour Administration actually been in office during the slump period it would have shown any greater scruples about imposing exactly the same sort of slump-time conditions upon the people as did the Government of the day, or that the present Labour leader would have been one whit less eager to give the same promise as was given by one of the co-leaders of the Government of that day that New Zealand would supply the maximum quantities of primary produce at the lowest possible cost, which was an objective tnat could only be realised by an abundance of 10s per week farm labour, and this latter was the aim that conditioned the whole of the slump-time Governments unemployment policies. Nor is it possible to believe in such circumstances that the unemployed could have fared any better had the Fraser Government been in office at the time. As for your correspondents personal queries, the answer is that the writer, as a single man without dependents who had profited from the good times preceding the slump, did not seek to avail himself of any form of assistance in the leaner times which he experienced during the slump—l am, etc., Ex-Labour Supporter.

Sir,—l am surprised that Mr Houghton thinks the Labour Government has satisfied the workers. Certainly wages have been increased, but the taxation the worker has to pay on wages and income and the increased prices for all commodities, and especially clothing nnn tootwear more than balance the wages increases Mr Nash’s speech in 193 j. when he promised to build houses and let them for 15s a week and remove sales tax, was an electioneering stunt. The bottom fell out df stabilisation when Parliament raised the honoraria and the taxpayer is still loaded. Mr F. P. Walsh’s directive for increased production has never been put into operation, and Mr Fraser visited the workshops and pleaded vvith the men to work and increase output. However, with the coal shortage the miners are still on a go-slow, and the watersiders going off the wharves so we can see how much notice they took of his entreaties to work hard. —I am, etc., October 20. No Camouflage.