The Christchurch Star. PUBLISHED BY New Zealand Newspapers Ltd. FRIDAY, AUGUST 14, 1931. BRITAIN’S DILEMMA.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 192, 14 August 1931, Page 8

The Christchurch Star. PUBLISHED BY New Zealand Newspapers Ltd. FRIDAY, AUGUST 14, 1931. BRITAIN’S DILEMMA.

THE ANNOUNCEMENT of Mr MacDonald’s determination to balance the Budget in 1932 shows that he has abandoned his policy of procrastination regarding the recommendations of the Unemployment Commission and the Economy Committee. And, indeed, the position is a serious one. Expenditure on unemployment insurance alone is exceeding income by £1,000,000 a week, and in June the debt to the Treasury amounted to £80,000,000. If this large accumulated debt were transferred to the Exchequer, it would add to the embarrassments of the Chancellor, and even then drastic and immediate action would lie necessary to put the fund on a sound basis. The increased contributions and reductions in benefits suggested by the commission would result in a reduction from £39,450,000 to £7,050,000 in the annual borrowing by the fund. The Economy Committee, reckoning on a treasury deficit of £120,000,000, goes much further, and makes recommendations which, if carried into effect, would involve a saving of about £100,000,000. Recent messages indicate, however, that it is not likely that the Labour Government will be willing to take the whole responsibility of these drastic economies, and both the Conservatives and Liberals anticipate that they will be called in to share the unpleasant task. To-day’s cablegrams state that the Conservatives are ready to participate in a threeparty conference, but will not accept any responsibility for the decisions, and in that they seem to be playing the party game favoured by Mr Coates, though not by all the members of his party, in New Zealand. NEW STANDARDS. nnHE CHIEF JUSTICE' was voicing the opinion of almost every motorist in the country when he said that a speed of 45 or 50 miles an hour, in some circumstances, could not be regarded as excessive. The circumstances he had in mind, of course, v/ere an open road and a modern ear, each built for the other. New standards of speed have been made possible by new standards of control, but the general acceleration demands new standards of caution as well. The time has arrived when the so-called “ boulevard stop ” should be insisted on wherever side streets discharge their traffic into a main highway. The letter of the law—that traffic should give way to other traffic on the right—is not applicable to main' highway traffic, nor is it safe that very slow traffic should be permitted to occupy the centre of a highway that is built for speed. LEST WE FORGET. ' | 'HE MEMORY’ of a scientist like Faraday can never be forgotten, but it is well that there should be occasional gatherings such as that which celebrated the centenary of his discovery of electro-magnetic induction. The great Humphry Davy declared that his greatest discovery was “ Mike ” Faraday, and there is reason to believe it if only for the wonderful work that led the way to the modern dynamo, which is now glorified in hydro-electric and other power plants with the name of generator. Davy, Faraday and Kelvin are a constellation of scientists whose discoveries were of the most practical use in the everyday life of the people, and the most charming thing about these great men was their simplicity of style, and their encouragement of the most elementary students. It was said of Kelvin, indeed, that the progress of physical discovery during the last half of the Nineteenth Century was due as much to the kindly encouragement he gave to students and others as to his own researches and inventions. Strange as it may seem, in view of the popular belief that the world has little more to learn in the application of science to industry, the one great dominant force in the world to-day is science, as Lord Bledisloe has reminded us, “ and to its manifold revelations no progressive nation can afford to be indifferent.”