e last considered by Australia,
which is a pastoral and agricultural country. We can develop Australia
as it should be developed, by constructing irrigation schemes and
opening agricultural areas. We could solve your unemployed problem, give
your soldiers a good living wage and increase your country's prosperity.
All we ask is that the Federal Government follow the States' example,
and pay us 10 per cent. on the first five years expenditure, the whole
amount of which we shall return at the end of that period with five per
cent. added, provided you arrange with the States to give us, free of
taxation, land they do not require."

A hurried conference of State Premiers was called and the situation was
carefully studied. Unemployed were crowding Australian cities. Private
enterprise was being crippled by the heavy income taxes imposed by State
Governments to pay the increasing cost of the "Syndicates" controlling
the Public Works of the various States. It was admitted that these works
were being efficiently carried out, and being mostly railway and
developmental constructions, they would be productive when completed.
Still, with private enterprise choked off, investment was at a low
level. The manufacturer was also being hard hit, for although some of
the tariff duties imposed by the Federal Government helped him, each
State appointed a Necessary Commodities Commission to regulate prices.
The manufacturer, who was being helped by the tariff, had to pay high
wages to manufacture his goods, but the Commodities Commission prevented
him raising his prices so that he could not sell at a profitable figure.
He, therefore, shut down and threw another mob of unemployed on the
market.

Another factor that affected the matter was the great flow of
immigration forwarded to Australia from Europe.

The Great War had put a sort of terror into the souls of men, and the
fear of heavy taxation that threatened to follow drove them across the
seas.

Every boat carried its full complement; so that when the "Syndicate"
declared its intention to open up agricultural areas, each State
recognised that this would not only absorb the unemployed, but as land
development meant development in other quarters, a general prosperity
would naturally follow. Hence they vied with each other in offering free
of charge the choicest Crown lands.

The States recognised that the Crown lands had cost them nothing, and
that the Commonwealth, having control of c