THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 2, 1935. AN OPPONENT OF CHANGE.

Wairarapa Age, 2 October 1935, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 2, 1935. AN OPPONENT OF CHANGE.

In opening his campaign for the Parnell seat, Sir Alexander Herdman quite frankly spoke as one who has been, as it were, standing still in a world of change and insists on measuring everything by standards that are obsolete. Personally, Sir Alexander Herdman is entitled to high respect. He played an active and distinguished part in pre-war national affairs and his legal career has been followed by a long period of honourable service on the Supreme Court Bench. Even the most estimable personal qualities, however, cannot justify anyone in attempt-

ing to ram down the throats of an unwilling generation, the political Ldeas of twenty years ago or more. That the attempt should be, made by Sir Alexander Herdman is all the stranger since he does not pretend that he is qualified to make it- “I have lived a life of seclusion for many years and Cajnnot profess to have an up-to-date kinowledge of public business/’ he tol4 his audience at Bemuera on Monday, njght.; This frank admission is to be set beside the fact that Sir Alexander has unsparingly condemned the recent, and present-day conduct of political business. Is he not in the position of a judge ~'ho pronnn”— —-with-

„ ..*ge who pronounces sentence .. aou having heard, much less considered, th< evidence?

Anyone who takes the trouble to analyse Sir Alexander Herdman’s speech will -find the general conclusions here submitted mdre than .fully i^orne 1 out in detdll. In addition to talking at large about extravagance and squandering, Sir'Alexander pointed out; that between lifer and 1934, the public: debt increased by'£55,000,000. ■ ■ On reference to the “Year Book,” it will be found that this annual borrowing rate of between five and six millions corresponds closely to that which ruled during the brief pre-war period > in which Sir Alexander Herdman shared responsibility for the management of the finances of the Dominion. On the other hand the present Government has done more than any other for many years to cut down total borrowing\and to dispense with external borrowing. As to Sir Alexander’s condemnation of the high exchange rate, the Hon. W. DdWnie Stewart, , a. finapcial authority! of considerably greater emineneej though he still thinks the exchange should not' have been raised, has declared also that it would be a serious mistake to reduce the exchange rate even gradually in

anything like existing circumstances. One of Sir Alexander's suggestions is that, in place of the present measures of assistance, loans should be made at a low rate-only do farmers classified as worthy of assistance. Could any proposal be imagined that would lead more inevitably to an indefinite and. wasteful extension of bureaucracy, to confusion and possibly to corruption? Broadly speaking, Sir Alexander Herdman invites New Zealand to jettison the rough and ready, but broad-based and reasonably effective measures that have been taken do stem the tide of depression and to revert to the policy of deflation which to-day stands discredited and condemned in every couh* try to which we may reasonably look for a helpful lead and nowhere more decisively than in Great Britain. To all that Sir Alexander has to say, the answer seems to be that it is better, whether from a moral, or a material standpoint, to move'enterprisingly with the times than to bewail change as something wicked that ought not to be allowed to happen., l