THE STATE AND RAILWAYS.

Press, Volume XLIX, Issue 14839, 3 December 1913, Page 8

THE STATE AND RAILWAYS.

Many things have happened in England in the last few years to create what, to use the language of the*day, may bo called-a. "railways problem." In England, as most people know, the railways are owned by private companies, which enjoy certain powers and privileges as public carriers, subject to restrictions relative to the carriage of goods andpassengers, the safety and convenience of the public, the amount of railway rates and the conditions of labour. The State has also the right of talking over any or all of the railways on certain terms. Towards the end of October the Government set up a Royal Commission, with Lord Loreburn as chair- : man, to investigate the relationship between the railway companies and the State, and it was generally supposed that the chief business of the Commis-. sion would be to report upon the problem of nationalising the railway systems of the Kingdom. Nobody has suggested that the State should buy the railways outright, since at a reasonable estimate they are worth £1,000,000,000, but there are many people who hold that the State might purchaso one of the large systems, or might take 6ver the management and pay the shareholders so much per cent, per annum. These will hope that the Commission will reverse the decision of the Commission of 1865, which was adverse to any departure from private management under Government supervision. Mr Asquith, who has frequently had to listen to deputations from the advocates of nationalisation, has never concealed his inability to find any satisfactory answer to various questions that suggested themselves to him. Some of these questions are dealt with by the "Horning Post," that Mr Lloyd George, in a speech at Swindon, had waxed enthusiastic over the low railway rates given to workmen by the Belgian railways, which are State owned. "They have national- " ised the railways," he said. "They "have not allowed great monopolies to "strangle the towns." The "Post" asks, first, whether these rates are paying rates, or whether "Belgian poli"ticians offer low rates to workmen in "exchange for votes to take the bal- " anco out of the taxpayers' pockets." Even if the rates were really economic, it would not follow that what paid in

Belgium would pay in Britain. In Xew Zealand we have seen that tho State ownership of railways leads to a demand for cheaper rates on the ono hand, and for higher wages on the other hand. Everybody realises and admits that these inevitable features of State ownership are its greattwt weaknesses, and can amount to grave dangers to tho public interest. Wo have accepted them, however, as a price to be pai-d for avoiding the ovil of private monopoly, but it does not appear likely that tho timo will be considered ripe in Great Britain for incurring those risks when tho State possesses very great powers of regulation—powers great enough to hold any trust movement in check.

Words really appear to have lost all meaning to some of our distracted "Liberal" friends. Sir Joseph Ward, vrho has evidently discovered in Auckland that his bearing during the strike has done for his hopes as completely there as elsewhore, fonnd a sympathetic interviewer, into whose ear he poured a whirlwind of intemperate language about lies and liars and "contemptible and despicable" opponents, and "wilful and deliberate perverters of the truth." This unseemly outburst is gravely approved by a 'Üboral" organ as tho speech of a "statesman" : "His moderation was characteristic of the man"! Incidentally we are told that "there was nothing in his protest against the slanders heaped upon himself that could encourage the strikers to think that they would fare better under his administration than they are faring under the administration of Mr Massey."

Onr "Liberal" friends, it is evident from the singular comment we have just quoted, have been doing a little thinking about the by-election. They are afraid that Mr Laurenson will lose hundreds of votes through his association with a party known to be sympathetic towards the strikers. Therefore tho "Liberal" cue for the moment is to suggest, as nearly as possible, that a "Liberal" Government would have acted just as the Massey Government has acted. The compliment to Mr Massey is a very high one. But our "Liberal" friends can surely not hope that the public has forgotten that until this week the "Liberal" Press was declaring that if only Sir J. G. Ward had been in power, "the employers" would have been brought to their senses, and so forth, by legislation. In any event, the effect of the Leader of the Opposition's activities was made plain for ail to hear by Mr P. O. Webb, * who, in an exceedingly truculent speech on Saturday night said, amidst a roar of applause from his Red Fed. audience, that if Sir Joseph Ward had been in power there would have been no strike. Mr Webb knows better than the newspapers what the Red Feds, think of and owe to tho Leaden of the Opposition.

The Wellington, organ of the "Liberal" Party has displayed a good deal more ingenuity and enterprise than other Opposition journals in carrying out its policy of assisting the striko. On Saturday last, however, it made tho blunder of oopying the Red Fed. method of picturesque invention. Cnder the headings, "Disgusted—Going Homo To-day—Country Men will Stay Here No Longer," it prnted what is assured its readers was an interview with a Sir Peter Hasloch, described as an Arbitration Unionist who had come from the Carterton district and joined the new Wharf Labourers' Union. Mr Hasloch was represented as saying that the men were disgusted with their treatment and were gong home. Enquiries were promptly made, and it was shown that nobody named Peter Hasloch had ever belonged to the Union, that nobody named Hasloch had .been cent, as alleged, from Carterton either as a special.or a labourer, and, finally, that nobody .named Hasloch, of Carterton, existed. Unless our contemporary can produce Hγ Hasloch in the flesh, it will naturally be concluded that.the story is a fabrication, concocted to support the earlier story, of the Opposition journal that the new Unionists were grumbling —a story that was completely disproved.

The uncandid controversialist adopts the same methods the world over. The other day the "Westminster Gazette" wrote that "Mr Balfour and Mr Chamberlain broke their promises in the Parliament of 1S00." A correspondent begged for particulars, but received no satisfaction, and ventilated his grievance in the "Spectator." This made it necessary for the "Gazette" to say something, and this is what it said:—

Wβ decline to enter into controversy with any and every correspondent who thinks fit to challenge a statement made in our columns; but if it were necessary it would be the easiest thing in the world to give chapter and verse for tho so-called "baseless" charge. That chapter and verse we have constantly gfven in the past, it can easily be discovered by anyone who wante to find it.

Wβ willingly make a present of this formula to those anti-Beformers who, when challenged to give particulars of the Reform Party's alleged slanders upon tho Leader of the Opposition, can think of nothing better to say than that the man in the KtTcet and general rumour are good enough authorities. Tho member for Avon, by the way, discovered a nejv and simple Tray out of a similar dilemma. Ho said that Mr Mossey had made a certain statement about electoral reform in "a speech in 1911." Mr Massey, a little surprised, asked, "What date?" But the member for Avon shouted that he was not going to have his time wasted, and plunged on to something c\sc !

What look very much like "Tied Fed." tactics are being introduced into the Lyttelton election at a very earlp stage. Aβ our readers are aware, a J meeting in connexion with Mr-Miller's candidature was advertised to take place at the Methodist Schoolroom, Opawa, last night at 8 o'clock. To this meeting ladies were specially invited. The "Social Domocrats" advertised a meeting for the same hour to be held at the Opawa bridge. When it is remembered that it is necessary to cross the bridge to get to the schoolroom from the chief residential part of Opawa, the inference is not unnatural that the meeting on tho bridge was called for the express purpose of interfering with the attendance at the schoolroom. Although tho police very properly moved on the "Professor" and bis crowd, the Red Feds, had the satis-'

faction of knowing that they intimidated a good many ladies, who shrank from facing a disorderly crowd at the bridge. If the Social Democrats think that conduct of this kind, in conjunction with their rowdy interference with the liberty of speech at Mr Miller's meeting at Woolston, is likely to benefit their candidate. Mx McCombs, they axe greatly mistaken.

Wo fancy Mr McCombs, who announces himself as a freetrader, will have some difficulty in persuading tho workers in tho numerous industries carried on in Woolst-on district that they will be benefited if the duty were taken off leather, leather goods, including of course boots and shoes, candles, and other products of the district. It i 3 not surprising that the Liberal journal urges the unfortunate candidate to "devote this strenuous week to educating the constituency on proportional representation," plainly implying that on other subjects he is likely to go astray. We don't think the Lyttelton electors care very much about proportional representation, but it is a comparatively harmless subject, and certainly much safer for Mr McCombs to handle than economic questions of which he evidently knows nothing.

The public will understand that the members for Avon and Riccarton are not really concerned at all over the Auckland movement to keep a register of men willing to serve as special constables in any future time of need. In calling it "a defence force independent of the ordinary force of the country," the member for Avon was misusing words and misrepresenting facts, as was his colleague when he in his turn asked if the Government was going to provide a captain. Their object was merely to create a prejudice against the special constables and maintain the Opposition's attitude of hostility to the measures the Government and the community have taken to protect tho public interest against the forces of intimidation and disorder. We fee] cure that these and other Opposition members have entirely miscalculated the opinion of their constituents. The people of Canterbury have as little sympathy as the people of tho other provinces with tho Red Feds, and with those who support them directly or indirectly inside or outside the House.

Thanks to our system of education and our method of marking voting papers, the returning officer at a Par° liamentary election is not troubled by illiteracy. In Italy, however, the problem has been amusingly acute. The percentage of illiterates there is high, and at the recent elections the electorate was increased by some millions, so a great many illiterate voters went to tho poll. There the voter writes the name of the candidate he favours on a voting paper supplied by an official, but other means of expressing his political preference have had to be found for the man who cannot write. According to information published in England a few days before the elections, a special voting paper had been provided for illiterates, in which the voter was to draw some sign—a flower or a star—indicating the candidate for whom he wished to vote, or draw an.actual portrait of the candidate. It is not stated whether any arrangements had been made by which voters for the same candidate would use the same sign. The task of a returning officer in these circumstances would be most unenviable. We are told that the voter must make his sign sufficiently clear to be easily recognised, but think of the trouble if there was a closo finish and a recount. Imagine what a fin© wrangle there might be. leading perhaps to a little knife-play, over the question whether the drawing on a certain voting paper represented the Liberal Gasparri or the Socialist Mario.

Wβ have dealt generally in our leading article with Mr J. B. Laurenson's speech at Woolston, but we may give a few lines here to his misconception of the "Labour problem" that confronts the country just now. Mr Laurenson says he is "in favour of Labour," and we ha?e no doubt that he is as sincere as Mr Miller and every other sensible person in wishing well to everything that makes for the real advancement of the wage-earners, whether they are unionists or not. But the Federation of Labour is not fighting for the wageearners nor for any principle. It is fighting only to establish the right of organised labour to break agreements, the right of organised labour to crush out opposition by crime and violence, and the right of a minority of organised workers to dictate to the majority. Mr Laurenson may as well make up his mind that ho will gain no votes from the Federation unless he goes all the way with them, and will lose votes if he appears to wish to go part of the way.