AN INSPECTOR - RIDDEN NATION.
[To THE EDITOR OP THE " SPECTATOR."' SIR,--4 think the following extract from a letter just received from New Zealand may interest your readers as a practical commentary on the results of Socialistic legislation in that
eountry
"This is an inspector-ridden country, and people who get the chance are leaving it. Food and raiment are very high-priced,--.-- milk, 6d. a quart for six months of the year, 4d. the other six; butter, is. 2d. to ls. 5d. a pound, according to season ; meat, one and a half times dearer than when we came (ten years ago) ; coals, .23 per ton, and rubbish at that ; firewood, comparatively as high. The cost of labour is now so great that Government has to snake work for the working (!) man. Hence the inspectors, for no one can employ workmen at the wages demanded by law. A. young engineer I know of came out about September. He couldn't get work at his own employment, so to keep himself going ho took a job as van-driver to a baker. One day he was stopped and asked what his wages were. He replied: 'I'm quite satisfied, and won't 'toll yen.' However, when his round was over his master informed him that ho would not require his services any longer. The inspector had been and said he was not to pay less than a certain wage—.22 10s. a week, I think—and the baker, though willing, couldn't pay such a wage. This sort of thing is being done every day, and the young fellow referred to thought he could do bettor in England, and is now probably on his way home."
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