The Southland Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. Luceo Non Uro. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 1928. STRAIGHT TALKING

Southland Times, Issue 20641, 13 November 1928, Page 4

The Southland Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. Luceo Non Uro. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 1928. STRAIGHT TALKING

If anyone were asked to epitomize the effect of the speech delivered by the Minister of Finance, Mr Downie Stewart, last night, the first word that would leap forward for service would be “sincerity.” There is nothing theatrical about this man. He approaches the task with the obvious determination to be understood and to put before his audience the facts as well as the deductions he thinks are sound. His voice is quiet but effective, and the steady flow of his discourse covers a tremendous acreage without revealing its extent, and this is due largely to the studied avoidance of flamboyancy, platform trickery or political stunts. There is no suspicion of the spectacular, no dodging of issues, no oratorical wriggling to divert attention from an awkward fact. Mr Downie Stewart’s method is to admit the fact, look it in the face squarely and supply the explanation. Though he is a Minister and undoubtedly was tired last night, he invited questions and answered them all. He sought no excuse in motives, asked for no quarter, but was ready to give it and so at the close of an address which for lucidity and effectiveness outruns anything heard in this part of the country for many years, he was accorded an ovation in which those of differ-

ing political opinions were ready to join. Mr Downie Stewart’s answers to all criticisms were frank and convincing, and it was interesting to follow the quick but courteous dissipation of Sir Joseph Ward's allegation that the £6,000,000 paid off the War Debt was raised by loan. Sir Joseph Ward made a keen point of that and declared he had never paid off loans with borrowed money. His indignation was apparent; but in the face of the facts it was never justified and clearly it rose out of his complete misunderstanding of a statement which should have been plain to him. The Minister of Finance can hit hard. His quotations from the speeches of Mr Veitch only a little while ago showed that the member for Wanganui, who is one of the sub-leaders of the United Party a few years ago, was saying about Sir Joseph Ward and the Liberal Party the very things he is now saying about Reform, that just a short time before the launching of the United Party’s policy, Mr Veitch was warning the country about the evil effects of borrowing large sums for Advances to Settlers, the practice he has now to support since his leader makes it the prime plank of his platform. Mr Downie Stewart’s treatment of the taxation question silenced one or two interjectors—it was too frank, too charged with facts to be anything but convincing. He completely answered the charge of the United Party leader that Reform had increased taxation in all forms, by detailing taxation remissions, by showing how income taxation for the small man had been reduced, while the men better off had been' made to bear a heavier burden, and by scotching the stupid, one might also say dishonest, method of arguing that Customs taxation has increased because Customs revenue has risen in a period when the arguers know that there have been general Customs remissions. In fact, it is dishonest to use this form of

argument. In the face of the knowledge they have or should have of the tariff, any politicians or political writers who cite the Customs revenue as evidence of an increase in taxation are not honest and not worthy of public attention because they know that the rise in this revenue is due to increased importations, which is evidence of increased spending power, and not of increased taxation. Half-truths are employed so frequently in political speeches and in political writings, that it is refreshing to listen to a frank statement like that delivered by the Minister of Finance. Mr Downie Stewart said enough last night to kill all complaint about the Te Wera settlement, and his treatment of the land settlement issue, though brief, was completely effective. When he had finished with the United Party’s loan proposals there was no room for the suspicion that they might be possible of achievement. In rapid review he showed how the £60,000,000 could not pay for itself, and how with remissions of taxation in many directions, subsidies to secondary industries, expenditure on land settlement, public works, schools and the completion of the hydroelectricity programme big surpluses were impossible. Can they be regarded in any other light? Sir Joseph Ward promises The £60,000,000 loan scheme which cannot pay. £10,000,000 for railways. Subsidies for industries. Money for land for settlement. Customs remissions. and Remission in taxation. And at the same time he is to produce surpluses out of which he will carry on the public works, the building of many new schools hinted at in his programme! The only way this can be done, because taxation is to be reduced while the revenue stands these heavy items, is sensational reductions in administration costs, not merely a few hundred thousand, but something like two or three millions a year at least. Mr Downie Stewart’s figures destroyed the idea that the Government has shut down on the Advances Department. The statement should be examined closely, because it shows that the advances to farmers and workers have been in the neighbourhood of £6,000,000 in the year. His reply convicted his critics of misquoting him when saying he could not raise money for the Advances Department for several years, and at the same time it showed that the United Party has failed to mention that in addition to its borrowing £70,000,000 in eight, or ten years, it must borrow large sums for the hydro-electricity schemes and other purposes which the revenue cannot meet. It is not saying too much that the speech last night left little of the criticism levelled at the Government unscattered. The Minister’s quiet methods, his frankness and his simple avoidance of theatrical efforts were ingratiating and made one wish that more of our politicians could not see that in these days plain, straightforward statements make better fare than the old drumwhanging notions and rhetorical bombast.