Statesmansiiip For Jobs

There are‘ now in Canada more than half a million men and women’ without jobs and seeking work. This statistic 530,000, to be exact), published on Thursday and referring to last month, is the minimum estimate. I

There is room for argument about its accuracy. th, members of the present Government used to claim when they were in Opposition that the Bureau ofstatistics figure under-represented the real situation; they preferred then to use the Labor Department figures, which at present show more than 800,000 people registered at employment Offices But arguments about definitions are beating the air, Th;

air, The’ answers, whatever they are, do not affect the

V human fact, which is that we today have many more people

out of work than at any time since the great depression in ’ the thirties, There have been ups and downs in employment . since the war, but never a down on anything approaching

the Present 593193 C0mPa1“atiV€1y Speaking, unemployment

has not before been a serious problem in postwar Canada. now it is. ’

, The change is less sharp in Manitoba than’ in most parts Of the country‘ The number Of unempbyed here is consider- ably greater than at this time a year ago, but not anywhere » near 50 big 5.‘ jump .35 in the C9u—ntI' y as a whole. No one however, will fall into any error of complacency on that ‘ account. We are one economy: if heavy unemployment con.

, tinues for_ any length of time‘ in the country as awhoje we are all going to suffer. . . ’

Unemployed men are more than statisti than political footballs. They are, as Mr. Peacriozngaidndlne January 16, a challenge to society. We can disagree end- lessly abollt What €X_‘<1Ct1y are SOCiety’s and the state’s re- sponsibilities for the individual in sickness and in health in youth and in _age; we can none of us doubt that in our mod- ern complex industrial economy—-which asks the individual to perform one small job that has no meaning except as it . is woven into the whole pattern, and which therefore makes » him dependent On the Dal£teI‘f1--i’CiS the responsibility of society as a whole to. ensure that there are as many jobs as willing workers. ._ .

This does not mean that unemployment can be nil- particular jobs are bound to disappear, and there W111 be .191 lays before the right man settles into the right next job. But

it does mean that the jobs to settle into must be there. It, ‘

does mean that no.man should be required to face for any length of time the hopeless, feeling of not being wanted,’ of having no useful. place to fill in society; some of‘ us will sometimes-be out of work this month, but not so many tha wenare deprived of any serious hope of earning next month’s living. If we are, than our industrial society is failing to work properly In just as real 3. sense as a car that is not firing on all its cylinders. . .

Whodunit {Politics Any responsible politician must understand this, and if

, hedoeshe will treat the unemployment situation as some-

» thing that goes far deeper than party politics. To do the’ right things _is’ far more important than who does them. But

ifwe are goinglto do the right things, we must , understand the cause of our troubles. /

An election at this time does not make such understand- ing easy. The Prime Minister on Tuesday night confirmed again that he is determined to take a partisan view. He asks

‘ for. support at the polls on the grounds that we have un-

' employment now because of what the Liberal Government '

Jf'tiid,I or failed to do, last March. The ‘facts provide no basis for this assertion. Through the first five months of 1957, .,_the number of people without jobs and seeking work aver- ; aged, little more than aitenth bigger than in the great boom situation a year earlier. As late as,May——-the’ last ‘month be- . fore the general election—the difference.betweenvunemploy- . merit in 1957 (194,000) and 1956 (165,000) was only 29,000. 1 While signs of’ weaknesswere beginning to appear in a few . industries, activity in most remained feverish, prices were ;-using and it was clearly in the public. interest that the Gov- .. ernment should maintain a firm grip against inﬂation. That was the Liberal policy, and the Conservatives——though no ~ one would think so, from what they say now———did not in fact change thepolicy after the election. They certainly had no reason to do so immediately. ‘ . ’

v ‘But through the summer the gaps. between unemploy- : merit in 1957 and unemployment in 1956 continued to widen. ‘ BY September and October, the 1957 ﬁgures reached more I i than double the 1956 figures. It was from‘ then on that

. °°°I10mi.c policies began to fail to match the country’s needs.

% It was then, and onto the end of the yearﬁthat Mr. Diefen- I

, baker and his Ministers were making soothing noises instead

, Of taking-the action that they blame their opponents for not A * h3‘?1I18 taken eight months earlier. That is why une-mployﬂ

i m91ii_ has now built up into what Mr. Pearson. rightly ’ fI@S¢I’lbed 'on,Tuesday night as an emergency situation.‘

xi ..I.t-is a situation that the Parliament of Canada -ought to ﬁling] with.;But since the Prime Minister has dissolved .. arr‘ient,vthe only way to put forward an adequate‘pro- , §I’mi1,'f0r dealingwith the emergency is through an election

;'iI5"ﬁ0I3- r . I’ 9‘ (Wiinipeg Free Press)

‘ }"'°§1‘«'=1,111.iTha‘t is what Mr. Person is doing and Mr. Diefen-

Liberals Ma,

‘(By Mark Harrison of Toronto Star)

MONTREAL, Feb. 19 —— The Liberal party soon may start shouting “fraud” at Prime Minister Diefenbaker’s talk of agreat new public works program to curb unemrployment. '

The prime niinister announced last week his government will spend a whopping $1,185,000,000. this year on job-creating works projects—- $280,000,- 000 of it by the end of March.

Details of the program were releas- ed by the prime minister's office af- ter a cabinet, meeting yesterday. And they indicate that few of the proposed projects are new. Most, in fact, are the routine maintenance, repair and construction programs embarked upon ‘each year by’ the various federal de- partments.

What’s more, the $280,000,000‘to be spent in the first three months of this year is—-to a major extent.—for projects conceived and approved by the former Liberal government last spring.

The rest of the proposed program is made up_ for the most part, of routine projects lifted from the 1958-59 esti- mates of the various departments-

befoire Parliament has been given the _

traditional opportunity ‘I to approve thelh. ,

1, There is no doubt many of the pro- _

iects will create jobs or maintain em- ployment in depressed areas. But the Liberals may well argue that they are the kind. of projects which have been undertaken by the federal government year after year when the economy has been buoyant. Thereisi nothing’ of an emergency or “crash” program about them, though the Conservatives, un- wittingly or otherwise’, have created that impression. A '

Included in the works’ projects, for example, are such,t.hin.gs as $46,000,000 for continuing work on the Trans-

[Canada highway_ $9,000,000vfor elimina-

tion of railway grade crossings and

$25,000,000 in federal grants for hospital ’

construction —-' all routine ‘annual ex- penditures.

. Also listed are such items as $106,- 000,000 for the St. Lawrence seaway and $40,000_000 for the Northern On- tario pipeline——p«rojects‘ launched by the former Liberal government which would have been continued even if un-

(Continued on Page .11)

$4oo,ooo,oooTax Cul Best WayiTo Fight

, iRead FiinePrint 7 To Find Tory Promises A Fraud

Deflation - Pearson

OTTAWA, Feb. 19 —— The $400,000,- 000 tax cut proposed by_his party to ‘remedy unemployment is “economical- ly sound and politically co-nsisten ," Hon. Lester Pearson, Liberal leader, declared last night.

Mr. Pearson, ’making his first free-.

time political broadcast over the

CBC’s English television network_ said_ I the tax reduction which he called for at the outset of the present election,

H. L. B. P 0

campaign was not a “give-away” but the best possible solution to the prob- lem of creating jobs in a‘hurry.

The Conservative‘ government, in: pointed out, had condemned his’ party for failing to introduce the measures last March which it was now propos- ing. At that time, however, inflation and not deflation was the “great and pressing danger,” the Liberal leader asserted. ’

Although passages of one report pre- pared by the government suggested the economy might be faced with a reces- sion, the great bulk of opinion in this country, as well as the U.S. and the U.K._ was that strong mdasures in the form of credit restrictions were requir-

2

ed to deal with’ the problem of rising‘ prices. . ' V

The Liberals’ tight-moneyvpolicy was

strong medicine “without sugar ‘coat- ing” and it didn’t make the govern-

ment popular, but it did check “run-,

away inflation,” Mr. Pearson continued.

While this was the situation in March, by autumn it had become apparent ‘-to many people, if not to the government, that the pendulum had begun to swing and that the economy was faced with a more serious ‘situation than I “brief pause.” ~ '

WOULD BOOST ECONOMY

In the Commons, he continued, the

Liberal party urged the government to

._act to meet this new emergency. The

government, however, dealt with it through “slot'macl1ine methods” and attacked Liberals as “prophets of doom and gloom.”

Mr. Pearson told the television audi-

ence that tax cuts now would put more money into the hands of t'he‘consumer and stimulate the economy much more rapidly than the program of public works decided on by the government,

’ which would take months to produce I

additional jobs in the required ‘volume.

Unlike previous occasions in which the Conservatives had promised tax cuts, the Liberal party recognized that they would lead the government into deficit ﬁnancing. But ever since the end of the last war the Liberal govern- ment had followed the policy of build- ing up surpluses in time of prosperity and creating a deﬁcit when a reces- sion faced the economy, a policy which the Conservative opposition had con- sistently criticized. '

Mr. Pearson accused the Conser- vatives of refusing to keep Parliament in session so that it could deal with the question of unemployment. They refused‘ to introduce a budget, refused to bring down the estimates of depart- mentssuch as trade and commerce and labor_ on which the subject could be

(Continued on Page 11) '

0 I Men Of Foresight

Friday, Feb, 23, -1953 The Guardian‘ Page I NATION'S BUSINESS

i,Tax Reductions Now I Do Make Sense

. At election time “bribing” the voters with their own T money is the game long hallowed by tradition. And we can count on it continuing while democracy lasts. 1

The Conservatives have their big pronouncements for extra spending. Last week along came Liberal leader Pear- son with his scheme to cut taxes by $400 million.

Winning elections is a factor in both programs.

But let’s all recognize the fact that the needs of the Canadian economy today with declining activity and grow- V ing unemployment are quite different to what they were six months or a year ago. / ‘

In the boom thatwas with us not long ago, inﬂation was the very real ‘problem. Keeping the, inﬂation ﬁres damped down was the task of our leaders. So We had tight

money and very minor tax reductions even though Ottawa _ "

had a good-sized surplus.

But now the picture has changed. Money and credit are easing, in line with the needlto support and -stimulate the economy rather than restrain it. p i

But the effects of easier money policy come about:

rather slowly. This is merely taking off the brakes,” not ‘-7 . / /

stepping on the gas.

Tax cuts do step on the gas. These would at once release ‘ 0,

purchasing power. Accelerated depreciation one-capital ex- penditure started in the fiscal year beginning April 1958 will give positive and immediate stimulus to this very important generator of economic well-being and growth. The tax con- cession to newlyweds is an ingenious and sensible induce- ment to family formation, also important to the "whole economy because it means not only more babies, but more‘ 1 sales of houses, refrigerators, washing machines and scores- of other family needs. ‘ 7

So don’t look at the election promises being made solely with the eyes of a cynic. Some of those schemes—under the economic conditions now prevailing——make very good sense.

(lfinancial Post) "

Biigigest Stake Of All I

When Lester Pearson brought the peace issue into the

\

election, ‘a Conservative newspaper, ‘exhibiting a gift for in-

apt metaphor, said he had pulled a “surprise rabbit” out of -.

‘ his hat. is no rabbit. It is the ace of trumps. I

The game is between Peace and War and the ‘ stake is human survival. Time is running out, Mr. Pearson warns... Canada is in “a key position” to help. prevent the outbreak ~_

of World War III; therefore “on March 31 the people will .

have to‘ decide which leadership is best fitted to carryout ; this role, as well as others?’ * = - ‘ '- I

The difference between Liberals and Conservatives‘-I, .:

here’ is not a matter of intentions, or even of broad "policy.

Mr. Diefenbaker, we are sure, desires peace as ardently as i I

Mr. Pearson does. Both parties support the NATO alliance... the United Nations, the British Commonwealth—althoughw

the Conservatives’ support of the Commonwealth isvqu.ali- .: /

fied in the case of its non-white members. ,

The question the voters must ‘consider is this: “Which party, which leader, is best endowed with knowledge and f skill to serve the cause of peace?” '

Mr. Pearsonls talent for this work need not be. labored here; it is freshly laurelled with the Nobel Prize. What about ' Mr. Diefenbaker? How does he measure up as a thinker and deer in foreign affairs? ‘

In eight months as the voice of Canada heihas shown 1 ' _himself a devotee of the flashy gesture and the hollow-

phrase (“The maintenance of freedom is the wage of sur- vival.”) He has also shown, a couple of times, that he is not proof against the temptation to play domestic politics with ' foreign policy. There is nothing in Mr. Diefenbaker’s record, either in opposition or in government, to suggest that he will . do more than skim or flutter around the problems that I divide and affright mankind.

The choice on this issue would be less . lopsided if Mr. Diefehbaker had a strong foreign minister to lean on. But to - everyone’s regret and to nearly everyone’s surprise, includ- ing our own, Dr. Sidney Smith has to date been an ineffec- tive secretary for external /

At the end of his Hamilton speech last Friday, honesty _ rather than any crass desire to make political capital com- pelled Mr. Pearson to say this: “I can promise you one thing: leadership——sincere and experienced ' leadership—in '0

the greatest crusade of all, that for peace. As head of the

government I would have greater opportunities to accomp- lish more than I have ever been able to do before, in that search for a solution to the ‘ultimate problem: how to avoid I a nuclear war which would destroy us all.” This is a modest reminder of the most profound issue in Canadian life.

In the struggle for peace, then, the Liberals offer Can- ada leadership of certified excellence, whereas their main opponents offer mediocrity. And if that struggle is lost, everything will be lost. ‘ l , , _

' I (Toronto Daily Star)

LIBERAL CANDIDATE IN. PRINCE

“It is a sensible and far-sighted policy to reduce the national debt in good times and permit it to increase in times of economic adversity. We must expect that at times when our employment, production and incomes are below satisfactory levels, our revenues will ' fall short of our oxpenditures. Indeed, at such times it will probably be necessary to incur expenditures of various kinds to assist In restoring’ better levels of employment and income.”

At the end of 1946 the national debt stood at $13,421,- 405_449, an average of $1,091.88 for every Canadian. Mr. Abbott paid off $373,648,901 Armin this national nliongage in 1947 and [in each of the next seven years payments rang- ing from‘ $23,547,277 to $676,119,656 were applied by tho Liberals to debt reduction. Over the first 10 postwar years ‘they reduced the national debt by $2‘141,036,485, until it was do-wn to the per capita figure of $706.35. '

The principle of reducing the national debt in good ~ times so that the government will be in a stronger ﬁnancial position to deal with a recession is known in economic

The time was April 29, 1947; the speaker, Liberal finance minister Dougla~s,Abbott. He had risen in the House of ' Commons to make the annual ﬁnancial statement and announce that in 1946-47 Canada had an unprecedented surplus of $352 million, more than the accumulated total If all the previous surpluses in the nation’s history.

jargon as cyclical budgeting. Successive Liberal finance ministers remained true to this policy since 1945 when Mr. J. L. Ilsley announced: “Our tax changw must be such as to contribute to employment and income, not merely to Inflation and speculation."

“Cut our taxes,” demanded the Tories. It was the

' only policy they could suggest to deal with a budget surplus. Instead, Mr. Abbott restated a Liberal principle: put some- thing aside in good times and you will have money to spend on countering hard times. It was not a popular policy for a politician to adopt; cutting taxes would have

One of the recessions foreseen by Mr. Abbott 11 year: ago is now with us and in these circumstances Mr. Pearson. the Liberal leader, proposes to deliberately budget for I deficit so taxes can be reduced and government expendi- tures increased as a means of stimulating business. The , nation is able to afford these expenditures largely because been the 93537 W337 9“t- 31“ the Public ““derS)‘*°°d and of the foresight of Liberal ﬁnance ministers who, In more accepted Mr. Abbott’: decision to cut down the national prosperous times, made provision for the future. debt. . (Toronto Daily Star)

Mlt. J. WATSON MacNAUGH'l' ~

whammy”, Mshzeis/iiisevrtadhydinPminm,GounivLib‘ndAII’L