The Timaru Herald THURSDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1926. BRITAIN’S BIG BURDEN.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXIII, 14 October 1926, Page 6

The Timaru Herald THURSDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1926. BRITAIN’S BIG BURDEN.

Cable messages from London which, we publish this morning' m a. sentence' or two tell a tragic story of Britain’s industrial depression. The huge army of_nnemployed is rapidly increasing, exclusive of the striking miners. Moreover, the trade returns for September indicate’ that British imports increased £3,789,000 and exports decreased £10,050,000. In other words the trade balance moved into a more unfavourably position against Britain. Added to these plain evidences of the plight of British trade and commerce, the facts.adduced by the moderate Labour leaders at the London Conference should awaken every member of the community to the need for industrinl peace. The Imperial Budget issued early in July budgeted for an increase in revenuo of £12,000,000, whereas up to September 24 there had been a docrcaso of £24,000,000. Such results wore only to be expected seeing that over a million miners are still refusing to work, and that 1,627,000 other persons figure on the unemployed list. Nor does this exhaust the total. A largo number of workers, as indicated by Mr Thomas nnd Mi Bon Tillet at the Labour Conference in London this week, are in pnrtial employment nnd are not. returned as unemployed, and there are many who do not appear in tho return from various causes. Such being the state of affairs it came as a shock to the British public to discover from the return issuod recently that oil July 1 the number of persons in Government employment was 6,G9~ larger than on April 1 last. excuses given for this are ‘ the growth of postal and telephone work and leave provision, increase in the labour exchanges,” and increase of work caused by the Widows’ Pensions Act passed last year. So that notwithstanding "all the tine promises of economy made by the Government during the past two years the bureaucracy is visibly swelling once more. London newspapers are saying that they cannot too emphatically state that the country is unable to afford l mass of bureaucrats totalling 113,000, apart from the Post Office, employees,' who may perhaps bo classed as industrial workers. In 1914, ' when _ the nation was far ‘richer than, it is to-day, it managed to carry on with 72,000. One big London journal claims that _ Britain's system of government is on much too extravagant a scale. All business men .without, distinction of party are agreed that the present burdens on industry constitute a handicap so serious that trade cannot revive until rates and taxes are lightened. Yet so far from lightening these burdens, Ministers 1 and the local authorities seem bent on adding- to them. The; national expenditure is proceeding at a rate of over £820,000,000 a year I —a rate which is approached in no other country in the world and which is to he regarded with the more alarm because it is now on .the upward grade. All hope of future reductions is fading in view of the liabilities which the coal strike will leave and tho expenditure which the new Pensions Act has imposed on the public. “But even this is not the worst,” says “The Daily Mail,” “Local expenditure is i>roceeding with equal recklessness. In some districts, as the result of the outlay on relief during the strike, tho rates are being mortgaged for mi indefinite period and immense debts are being piled on the shoulders of the ratepayers. There are mining districts where the rates are already 30s. in the £. No industry can long support finance of this character: and how the collieries are to pay the rates when they again get to work is a grave problem.” If vast expenditure on all form of relief is necessary to human happiness, Britain ought to be the most contented ana prosperous country in the world. Nowhere is there such an outlay in doles'; nowhere else are hundreds of millions paid to subsidise idleness or create pauperism. Yet Britain goes from strike to strike. The London “dolemcn” are the raw material which Communism needs for its votaries and disciples. During the week-end British financiers conferred with representatives from Germany. The negotiations convinced such men as Sir' Noberi Horne that “the only chance of salvation for the economic life of Europe lies in a Locarno pact in industry.” Having regard to all the facts, the conclusion is forced on the observant citizen that what is sorely needed on the industrial battlefield in Britain is a. little more of the Locarno spirit on both sides of the industrial frontiers. ’Then Britain may have a chance to heal her economic wounds, and Like the first steps along* the long road to complete restoration of financial and industrial good health.