POINTS OF VIEW

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 25, Issue 3766, 8 June 1936, Page 5

POINTS OF VIEW

OPINIONS OF OUR READERS. SOCIAL CREDIT Sir,— My attention has been drawn to two letters in your columns recently, over the nom-de-plume “Why?”, containing a number of assertions which are contrary to fact, and While we do ndt usually reply officially to anonymous correspondents, may I beg a little of your space to clear up any misapprehension which may possibly exist in the minds of your readers? ? In the first place, your correspondent says, “It was, and is, well known that the supporters of the gallant Major and the followers of Michael Joseph were in league together, to the extent at any rate, of a working partnership to ensure the return of the Labour Party to the Government benches.” Now, Sir, the Douglas Social Credit Movement in New Zealand is an incorporated society, nonpolitical and non-sectarian, and at no time has it had any working arrangement with any political party, whatever its members as individuals may have done in respective constituencies in which they record their votes. Last Novembqr members of the Movement could be found on the committees of both Labour candidates and candidates who wdre not members of the Labour Party. Our members please themselves in politics.

Nor is your correspondent any better informed in the matter of the National Dividend as a cash payment to all citizens. The New Zealand Movement has never advocated it officially. The Movement was founded as a Dominion organisation at Okoroire in January 1933, and for the first year devoted its time to propaganda on general lines with no definite plan for New Zealand. At its last Annual Conference, over two years ago, the Movement decided that the time was not opportune for a National Dividend in New Zealand. The position was again made cleat; quite recently by Colonel Closey in the following words, “In this lightly developed land we cannot AT THE MOMENT establish the basis of a National Dividend. With our inadequate equipment, heavy indebtedness, and large overhead, we are content AT THIS STAGE to plan for the saving of the farmer, the restoration of trade, and the re-starting of industrial activity.” So then, as far as New Zealand is concerned there was “no National Dividend clause” to quote your correspondent, so that it could not “have been dropped,” to quote again your correspondent As regards our attitude to Labour’s monetary policy, the Government has not yet revealed enough of its policy for us to take up an official attitude one way or the other. He is a wise man who withholds adverse criticism of the artist until enough of the picture has been completed upon which to fonn an opinion. In the matter of Alberta, the limitations of space do not permit me to clarify the position of the Aberhart administration who, being a provincial government in a Federation cannot exercise the full control of tlheir money system possible to a sovereign state such -as .New Zealand without any over-riding Federal Government.

In conclusion Sir, I cannot help thinking that it is a little curious that your correspondent should take up your valuable space to ask questions which could be answered more fully at the regular meetings of any of the local branches of tlhie Movement where questions and discussion are always welcome. However, if he is genuinely interested and seeking further information, I shall be glad if he will call on me at any time mutually convenient. I am, etc., J. H. PENNIKET,

President, Hamilton District Council Inc. D.S.C.M. of New Zealand, 9 Milton Street, Hamilton. A SINGULAR DISEASE Sir,— The adminst-ration of New Guinea is said to be suffering from a most unusual disease —the embarassment of riches. Its revenue far exceeds its expenditure. There is a population of but 5,400 people apart from the native population. Out of the 5,400, one quarter are Chinese, and the total taxation levied per head upon other than the natives is £66. Thus the art of squeezing is being practised to an alarming extent by those in charge. It must be pretty severe, when it aggregates four times as much as is extorted in this taxridden country. It is sincerely to be hoped Friends Nash, Savage and Co., do not out-Herod the administration ruling New Guinea.—l am, etc., CONCERNED ACCROSS THE TASMAN Sir, —It acts as a kind of tonic to occasionally read an Australian newspaper. We soon find those across the Tasman suffer from much the same financial aches and pains as we do in this Dominion. Our populations increase in much the same ratio, making allowance for a difference of four and a half to one in numbers. They are making the same large losses on unproductive and political railways. They are enduring the same acute transport problem, but are finding out they are no wiser in keeping back the tide of progress than Canute was with the broom. They have piled up a national debt of £1,250,000,000. Worked out on a population basis there is only a matter of shillings between each country. We both talk in the same silly manner about immigration. Neither of us are sincere. When we boast about revenue from petrol tax and the spending of it we are not poles asunder in the final analysis: In 1935 through customs and excise Australia collected over £7,000,000 by way of petrol tax. This tax from small beginnings rose bit by bit “to tide over the depression.” It has. become just as sure and fixed as our own colossal load. This aptly refers to income tax, unemployment tax and sales tax. Australia’s petrol tax has been diverted—stolen is the proper

word—just as thoroughly as it has

been in this fair land. —I am, etc., MAORI.

DIRTY TE AWAMUTU Sir, —In your last issue “Veritas” writes of Dirty Te Awamutu. I can substantiate all he says—my attention was also called to the disgraceful state of Alexandra Street. I have no hesitation in stating there was more rubbish on the street between Roche and Teasdale Streets than would be found in the whole of any other Waikato town, and in Roche Street there was a heap of straw in the water-table. No wonder sump gratings become choked in wet weather. Can nothing be done to keep our rising little town as tidy as our neighbours?—l am, etc., • G. A. EMPSON. FARMERS’ UNION PRESIDENT. . sir, —Mr W. J. Polson, who claims to represent and speak for the thousands of “small" farmers, seems to have a habit of being on top of the “poll” both politically and in regard to his facts. In a recent report of his speech at Feilding to the farmers conference he is reported as saying that the farmer is very definitely individualistic. If this is true why does Mr Polson remain a member (and nominal leader) of a union whose second objective according to his own ucok of rules is "to encourage cooperation among its members." Surely the Farmers' Union is a collective group, or is it the plaything of a few chief executives anxiously rushing around to stop the incoming tide. Mr Polson might also care to explain: (1) Why there are so few individualistic dairy factories if the farmers are as individualistic as he claims? He knows as well as anybody in New Zealand that there are a mere handful ot proprietary factories among some 500 co-operative dairy factories. (2) Why the Farmers' Union (note union) is so anxious to obtain orders on the co-operative dairies for payment ot union subscriptions? Another matter that should be explained by Mr Polson is just where and when fie met the recent C.W.S. delegation and discussed with them their buying policy. In another part of the same report Mr Polson is quoted as saying “The C.W.S. bought on the cheapest market in order to supply its members with commodities at the lowest rate, while our farmers’ desired to sell on the highest market." The implied meaning being, of course, that the C.W.S. pay low prices for our primary produce. Mr Polson, who casts reflection upon the business ability of the present Cabinet, shows a characteristic misconception of the apparent simplicity of the farmer if he fondly conceives of the poor depressed (bog or little) farmer parting with his mutton to the C.W.S. buyers at a price less than that obtainable from other sources. Mr Polson knows that the aim of the C.W.S. is to buy direct from the producer, not at a low price but at a fair price to both producer and consumer. This policy has been tried out in New Zealand for the past four or five years, and when Mr Polson and his friends learn that the C.W.S. is now our largest British customer in primary produce, no doubt from the Polson angle, the end of the farmers is night. Rubbish! Just .soon as the farmers and workers, whether ot Great Britain or New Zealand, learn that they can exchange their goods and services without the costly aid of third parties, they will joyfully hold a party and share the gieat resultant saving in costs of dis tribution that are now such a feature of Mr Polson’s and his friends’ wonderful "free” marketing system. The small farmer is, at last, propaganda notwithstanding, realising that the problem facing him is not the costs of production, but the costs of consump tion (including distribution). And whenever the costs of consumption arc being reduced one should carefully track down the strident sounds of dissension.—l cm, etc., UNIONIST. INITIATIVE DISCOURAGED. Sir,—When New Zealand was peopled by immigrants of the type of the Victorian age we had a go-ahead country because individualism was not bound and gagged by Acts of Parliament. To-day we are having a war between Government and private enterprise, and the "best immigrant”— the baby—is on the casualty list. In this war the Government is well entrenched by legislation against private enterprise. For instance, commercial motors are not allowed to help settlers, so no new land is being opened up, and young men are forced to the cities to live in crowded rooms and flats, bad alike for their health and for national development. Machinery and science have made life easier, but opportunist politicians step in and take credit for this, and force upon the people their “philosophy” of “something for nothing.” It’s the same trouble in the United States. While "nothing for nothing” was their watchword they went ahead. If Government enterprise were proving a success there would be some justification for it, fipt it in turn loafs on the taxpayer. The system is bad for the country and needs alteration.—l am, etc.,

AN OPEN LETTER. Sir, —My denunciation of institutional dietetics has produced a gratifying reaction; negative, of course, at this stage, on the part of those responsible, but the public would hardly expect them to plead guilty. They couldn’t. They have the same confidence in their beliefs as the sponsors of orthodox religion or economics. To read the indignant replies, one would suppose that the public had never lived in boarding houses, hotels or schools, or existed upon hospital diet; or that they were all ignorant of the essentials of right feeding. Perusal of some of my mail might prove a shock to complacency. The actual quality of goods supplied, or of standard or preparation, defective as these often are, are not the main

points at issue. The danger lies in the almost invariable excess of denatured, acid forming foods, such - as meat, starch and sugar; and the grave deficiency ot vitamins and mineral salts. Destructive sooner or later as is the conventional .diet for those still comparatively health, it may become fatal to the sick; large numbers of whom can be cured by fasting and right use of foods. One doctor is reported as saying, "Modern medical opinion is that the ordinary mixed diet as served in hospitals, hotels and homes, is quite satisfactory.” He has committed himself, anyway, and so have the matrons and schoolmasters who agree with him. The same doctor says, “As far as fasting Is concerned, the body needs more food than the normal amount in prolonged fevers." This is an astonishing admission of ignorance of the significance of nature’s cleansing efforts, that may be countered by a reminder that the usual reason for fevers being prolonged is that man is the only animal who hasn’t enough sense to stop eating when he’s sick. Moreover, if he fed as he should there wouldn’t be any fevers. One schoolboy, knowing as little of dietetics as those who approached him for; an opinion, claims that "the value of the meals we receive is borne but by the general splendid physique of the boys.” It is. Even school doctors, though they do not yet recognise that the majority of unhealthy conditions in the boys are mainly dietetic in origin, have furnished disquieting reports of the extent ot the evidence of malnutrition in schools. Much disease is in the nature of a degenerative process, and one of the most prolific causes is faulty employment of food. So many people are becoming conscious of this truth that the indignant official disclaimers are 'ikely to be completely unconvincing. They are, in fact, strangely reminiscent of the pitiful wail raised by orthodox finance (without avail), on the eve of the last election. It may be convenient to ignore me, and still prove embarrassing and impossible to hold back the truth. With which are my detractors concerned with discrediting me, or with making certain of the truth? Is there a conspiracy to prevent the truth from becoming generally realised, that a tremendous amount of disease is dietetic in origin, and that the conventional diet Is to blame? No. Those responsible simply aren't aware of it. That’s all. And that is why I speak.—l am, etc., ULRIC WILLIAMS. Wanganui.