A WORLD IN ARREST.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XLVII, Issue 15466, 10 March 1921, Page 6

A WORLD IN ARREST.

- THE REAL CAUSE OF UNEMPLOY- ' MENT. i f Tucked away behind the thoroughfare 1 of Houndsditch, and hidden down by 1 the riverside, there are mang gigantic 3 warehouses belonging to the Port of - London Authority, crammed full of goods 3 which has been poured on to our shores > and have not yet obtained a purchaser. 5 If you want to gain a vivid sidelight on T the causes of the present unemployment in this country, you cannot do better - than spent a day, as I have just done . by the kind courtesy of the Port of ; London Authority, in wandering through - these warehouses and observing the i piled-up accumulation of precious goods 5 waiting in vain for a buyer. f For by such a journey yog will gain l a clear perception of all the present l cheeks and impediments in the free cir- • dilation of the blood of trade through - the arteries of Europe, and you will - understand why, in spite of all the hopes > and dreams of tho last t-liree or four 1 years, the world is so slow to recover j its health after the disease of war. j RECORDS OF A PILGRIMAGE. 1 You will also by .such an errand f gather somao enlightenment as to future > policy, and you will realise that there » is no chance for the world unless it dej termines to cease indulging in the pas- ’ sion of hate and to enter with deter- [ mination upon the paths of peace and ■ good will. s These sound great morals to draw from a visit to the free warehouses and bond , warehouses of the London Docks, but ' take one or two records of what I saw b during my pilgrimage. I passed through t great store rooms absolutely crammed . with rubber from all parts of the rubber . world—white rubber from the Malay . States, black rubber' from West Africa, [ brown rubber from other estates—such an accumulation of rubber as, I suppose, i has never been-seen in tho history of the world. The superintendent informed me that this accumulation began about a year ago, and bad been increasing day by day. They are so glutted with rubber that they do not know where to turn for storage. No wonder that there is a depression on the rubber market! Well, what is the cause? I probed this very carefully, and I discovered that it. was mainly because the re-exports’ of rubber from England to Europe have practically ceased. It is the cessation of the demand from all those gyeat countries which have been wrecked by tho war—Russia, Germany, Austria, and now Italy. For a time tho demand from our home market kept things moving, but now that has almost ceased, and so the rubber sticks in the warehouses, and soon tho pulse of that industry will gradually stop. CARPETS FROM THE EAST. But perhaps even a more remarkable case is that of tho carpets from the East. During the war no carpets came from tli© East to this country. But all through those years the busy millions of the East—of t Persia, India, and Central Asia —had been weaving their wonderful textures, and since 1918 their carpets have been pouring in like a flood. At first there were some rich people to buy them—the people who had been made rich by the war. But now they llavo spent their money, and so these gorgeous carpets, with all their glory of color and design, are being piled up on tho gloomy storeys of the London warehouses, until now the Port Authority can no longer open the bundles to • display them to prospective buyers. It is scarcely an exaggeration to say that the('c, in those vast rooms, you seo the decorations of a decaying civilisa- 1 lion, the splendour of a wealth that { “held the gorgeous Elast in fee.” There 1 is a glut in the artery, and the circulation has- nearly ceased. Will it . ever ’ resume its full course? One sometimes doubts it! • i Or pass inlo the vast chambers full 1 of tobacco and cigars which are pur- * posely left in bond by the merchants 1 until they'are required by the public. i j Here have a definite test of con- 1 sumption, because no merchant will pay (lie present high d 'fics until ho is sure 1 of a purchaser. Here then, in theso 1 rooms, you seo the great chests full .of * splendid Coronas, waiting, to be bought 1 bv some wealthy millionaire or some 1 . 1 rich club. 1 FULL STORES AND EMPTY QUAYS. 1 But the clubs are bard hit, and their members are not smoking Coronas. The millionaires are paying away in supertax what they used' to give for cigars. So these beautiful cigars lie there await- j ing a smoker. j Tho same thing applies to the store j rooms glutted with cases of tea waiting . to bo drunk by people who, in their ; turn, are waiting till it is cheaper; or, \ even more significant than anything >• else, the vast stores of wool that are t hoarded up waiting for the day when j poor men and women will bo able to af- t ford the necessary, clothing for themselves and their children. .. In a word, it is a picture of a world , in arrest, like a river frozen to a glacier, and it has its counterpart in the empty c quays that yon find by th© riverside. ( The world is in arrest because so | largo a part of it is suffering from T paralysis of function, and if you want j to find the key to the cure of unem- j ployment in England you must lock far c away from Our shores to those countries which used to set the dockers working by the. Thames-side.—Harold Spender in the Daily Chronicle. B