AT THE TEA TABLE.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XLV, Issue 12084, 22 June 1920, Page 5

AT THE TEA TABLE.

SOME TOPICAL TALKS.

"What do you think of that British scheme'for encouraging agriculture?" asked the Critic. *'l notice that its promoter called it the Farmers' Charter."

"It seemed to me," said the Politician, "more like a scheme to establish State-rontrol of the British farmer and reduce him to the position of a serf, as is being attempted in this country on behalf of the labour unionists. If you arbitrarily fix the price of the results of a mau's work there is little difference between that and slavery." "They don't dare to do it with the products of any other industry," said the Cynic." "Still." said the Landlady, "is it not desirable that agriculture should be encouraged so that Britain would he less dependent on foreign nations for her supDlies?" "Theoretically that is so," said the Critic, "but practically Britain's best method of [ensuring supplies is to develop trade with the overseas people and keep the trade routes open. Her navy servbe the latter purpose and so long as it holds maritime supremacy she will never be short of supplies." "Still I don't understand why Britain should not supplv her own wants," said the Landlady." "That is because you have not fully considered the subject," replied the Critic. "Just think of the millions of her population, the land tenure there, and the slowness of the agriculturists to adopt up-to-date methods Then again the British climate is by no means s© favourable for agricultural operations as is our own and that of many other portions of the Empire. Take Manitoba for wheat, .for iustanoe, and our own country for dairy produce, meat and wool. " "These things," said the Cynic, "partly explain why land is dearer in New Zealand than it is within a few miles of the World's Metropolis. If agriculture in Britain does greatly improve, however, mav the demand for our produce not be lessened?" "All that Britain cau produce and all we can send her," said the Sage, "is but as a drop in the bucket. She must always continue to draw the larger portion of her grain supplies from the vast spaces in Canada and Russia. The 'Farmers' Charter merely represents a pose of the politicians."

' 'That's rather a neat scheme of the interested parties," remarked the Critic, "to use the Prince's visifc to Canberra to lay the foundation stone of the Fedoral Parliament to compel the Commonwealth Parliament to build the capital there."

"That capital will be a monument of local jealousy if the Apstralians are ever foolish eonugh to waste money on it," said the Politician. "None of the States would agree to either of the large cities outside .its own boundaries being chosen as the Federal Capital and as compromise is always the easiest plan for the place-hunting politicians to adopt they compromised by selecting a site equally inconvenient for eveiybody concerned. It is rather satisfactory to note that there is a money difficulty in the way of building the capital, because it is just; possible that poverty may force the people to do that which coramonsense should have induced them to do."

"I hope so, too," said the Cynic. "The position seems to be that Hughes may safely tell the others that as there aro no funds, then in the pidgin English of the Chinaman 'No Can borrow—no Canberra?" "What on earth do they want more cities for in that laud where the country is aching tor settlement';"' said the Critic. "All the States are tho same in- this respect, and I noticed from recent statistics that while New South Wales has a population of about four millions, no fewer than two millions of these live in Sydney, and its environs. It surely shows that something is wrong when the cities are so overcrowded and the country has great unoccupied spaces." "It means," said the Cynic, "that assuming that all the two millions outside the city aro producers, they ar.i sustaining the other half of the population. Is it any wonier that the cost of living goes up? The result is the same as if the two millions in the country districts of New South Wales were maintaining two million soldiers on foreign service."

"I have been rather struck by the fact that the Labour Unionists in Australia are violently opposed to the idea of profit sharing," remarked the Critic. "I had an idea that their chief grievance was that they did not get a sufficiently large share of the profits, yet when a share is offeied they refuse it with scorn."

"The resaon is quite plain," said the Cynic. "They don't want a share; they want the whole, and it seems to me that they will soon be getting it. I notice that some of the employers are making a stand, but I question whether they will long succeed. Another reason for Labour leaders opposition is that if the workers were satisfied the agitators would find their occupation gone."

"I wonder what these labour organisations would do if the farmer resolved to work only forty hours a week," said the Critic. "There would very soon be a vast number of starving unemployed in the cities."

"The latest demand of the Australian politicians is to make it compulsory for every elector 'to vote," said the Politician. "That eeems t© me to be an assault on freedom, Why should I have tu vote if I do not think any candidate worthy of support?" "It is rough, indeed," said the Cynic, "first to disgust all decent men with politics and then strive to make them vote for nonentities, blatherskites, or the scum of the earth." A JAYJK PENNE.