To finish off the picture, there are an unsound financial
structure and unemployment figures proportionately higher than those of Great Britain. The Government's new proposal seems to be to pile Pelion on Ossa by a new schedule of tariffs; including a three per cent. Customs surtax all round, by the total prohibition of luxury imports, and by a higher supertax on -certain items. All this satisfies, we suppose, what Mr. Fenton, the Minister of Customs, has called " a scientific tariff revision." Our Protectionists have yet to explain how a drastic reduction of imports can translate itself into an encouragement of exports. When we write, merchants are falling over one another to remove goods from bond. Mr. Scullin will also propose a Referendum for amending the Constitution and Bills to abolish the Federal Development and Migration Commission.
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