The Christchurch Star PUBLISHED BY New Zealand Newspapers Ltd. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1934. WORLD TRADE PICKS UP.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20482, 7 December 1934, Page 6

The Christchurch Star PUBLISHED BY New Zealand Newspapers Ltd. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1934. WORLD TRADE PICKS UP.

' k 'HE NET TONNAGE of vessels arriving in the United Kingdom with overseas cargo in October showed an increase of- 4.4 per cent over the 1933 figure, and departures with cargo were 6 per cent higher. Coasting trade showed a more substantial advance. The figures necessarily reflect a picking up in British shipping, for British ships carry 90 per cent of the coastwise trade of the British Isles and 54 per cent of all inter-Empire trade, as well as 38 per cent of all ocean freight. Even more significant, however, than the stimulation of the shipping trade itself is the evidence of recovering world trade, and the improvement is one that we would have been extremely glad of in the despairing days at the bottom of the depression. Britain to-day originates about 13 per cent of the total world trade, hut 60 per cent of her ships must seek employment in outside trades. Foreign subsidies have threatened to reduce her lead, but the position to-day is not unhopeful. A SCRAMBLE FOR SEATS. L'OR SIXTEEN SEATS on the City Council forty-one Labour candidates are offering themselves. A large number will be weeded out, but it is probable that a number greatly in excess of sixteen will go to the ballot, for now that we have repealed proportional representation all sorts of electoral vagaries will reveal themselves, the more so as the city remains one huge electorate. It has been suggested that wards should be reconstituted to simplify the voting, but any alteration of the political map may lead to an unfair or abnormal arrangement for the purpose of advancing particular interests, and in the old days of wards it was demonstrable that the central ward and St Albans were over-represented on a population basis. The citizens certainly have a rude shock in store for them as the result of a reversion to the first-past-the-post system, and the ruder the better if it opens their eyes to the retrogressive action of the present council in repealing a scientific system of voting. BRIGHTER HANMER. TF THE Health Department could be infected with some of the enthusiasm of the Progress League for the development of brighter bathing in Hanmer it would be to its own profit. The township is handicapped by an over emphasis in the minds of tourists and holi-day-makers on the influence of the hospital in local life, but the Health Department is also, on its part, conscious of misconceptions concerning the type of mental patient treated there. The hospital deals with cases of ordinary nervous disorder, rheumatism and rheumatoids, but on no account are mentally-affected patients or border-line cases admitted. Nevertheless there is an impression abroad that the hushed hospital atmosphere filters through to the township generally. This is certainly not good for tourists. But if the emphasis were the other way —for a gayer playground for holi-day-makers—the amenities of the township would have a cheering, healthful effect on the patients. TIMELY ADVICE. 'VTUTHETHER one is happy or ~ ▼ harassed when Christmas actually arrives may depend less upon the good wishes of friends than upon one’s own approach to the problems of Christmas. For a multiplicity of friends increases the difficulties of the proper selection of suitable gifts even when the task is lifted up by the spirit of the season in open-heartedness and openliandedness. It is a truism that the real secret of happiness is to live for others, yet in the busy Christmas season this living for others needs to be well thought out beforehand, or the happiness evaporates in the* last weary struggle of finding something for everybody. Dr Johnson remarked that the only use of money was to give it away, but it is a pity to give it away uselessly in uneconomic selection during a Christmas Eve- stampede.