THE RAILWAYS.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 461, 20 March 1909, Page 4

THE RAILWAYS.

The attitude of the Government and its friends towards the critics,of the railways administration has very greatly altered in the last year. A year ago the critic who complained that the railways do not pay could count upon drawing upon himself a violent onslaught from Sir Joseph Ward and his journalistic To-day it is not merely admitted that the railways do not pay; it is not evon seriously contended that the annual loss on the system is defensible as a matter of policy—Mr. Millar has definitely stated that public policy requires the railways to pay; the people who onco so fiercely resented criticism are driven into the last trench, and are concentrating their energies on resistance to the movement for independent control. The Government and its friends, reflecting upon the painful extent of their retreat under the firo of criticism, are apprehensive that the victory of criticism will extend to the re-, moval from the Government of its finest electioneering machine, The public may congratulate itself upon this wholesome evidence of, the alarm and of the power of a live public opinion in checking maladministration in the public Departments. The arguments which are being advanced for the retention of the railways administration in political hands are weak in. the extreme. ■ When Ma.-Millar publicly repudiated the 3 per cent, policy and condemned every argument which Sir Joseph Ward and his supporters used to advancc in defence of it, he destroyed once and for all the repute of these advocates.

Very few people will doubt that a capable Minister, if he were free from the obligation to study the needs of the Ministry, could make the railways pay their way. Nobody would dream of suggesting —although it is stated that the suggestion has been made by the critics of tho railways administration—that "it is impossible for a Statc-controllcd system to be run at a profit." The case against the management of the system does riot require such a postulate as that. What we contend is that it is utterly impossible for the New Zealand railways to be run at a profit so long as they are used for party purposes, at the general taxpayer's expense. However anxious Mr. Millar may be to bring about a better stato of affairs, he cannot act in defiance of Cabinet, and the policy of the Ministry is still, as it has always been, to place its own preservation before everything. The railways, in any country in which they are owned by the State, offer such vast .opportunities for manipulation in the interests of party that the public good requires that thoy shall be kept out of the hands of the Government of the day. In New Zealand the natural conditions arc so favourable to the financial success of the railways that they should have been regularly returning a net profit, after meeting interest charges, for many years past.- Instead, they have lost vast sums of money.

In Australia the Commissioner system is producing magnificent results. The railways pay their way, give the public a fine service, and return large sums to the general funds. This is accomplished, also, in spite of the fact that the conditions of working are much less advantageous than they are in 'New Zealand. The public in Australia would not tolerate the restoration of their railway services to Ministerial control. A favourite argument of the advocates of political control in this country takes the form of absurd references to the Commissioner system as a system of irresponsible autocracy. The friends of political control must rate the intelligence of their audiences very low when they refer to Commissioners as "individuals who are responsible to no one." The system which we long ago began to advocate, and which some of our contemporaries are also advocating, would consist of Commissioners responsible to Parliament. That the public interest would thus be safeguarded against any chance of maladministration by the Commissioners— who would have no incentive to act otherwise than for the benefit of the country and their own reputations—is too obvious to require further notice. To speak of the Commissioners as "irresponsible" persons is as foolish as to talk of "irresponsible" people on tho Supreme Court Bench.Equally absurd is tho desperate appeal of the Government's friends for support of tho theory that to attack the corrupt and extravagant administration of a political party is to attack "the ability of the democracy to manage its own undertakings." By setting up tho Commissioner system, Parliament would not give up one fraction of its ultimate authority: it would only deny itself the right to interfere with the railways excepting manifestly in the public interest. Members of

Parliament.are encouraged, under the existing system, to condone Ministerial policy and to compete, indeed, for improper concessions for their various districts. How helpful that is to the party plans of a Government anybody can see. Nor can matters ever be otherwise unless the railways are placed boyond the reach of manipulation in the illegitimate interest of a person or a district. Safety lies only in the removal of the system from political hands.