NON-PAYING RAILWAYS.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 583, 11 August 1909, Page 6

NON-PAYING RAILWAYS.

It is not without both pleasure and surprise'that we find so, devoted a, Government supporter-.as the Oamaru Mail approaching so near to sharpness as in the following sentences at the end of an article denouncing the' Otago Central .Railway:— As it is, quite sufficient railway construction is proceeding throughout New Zealand, and one-is naturally led to wonder whether there are not amongst the lines in progress some more Otago Centrals. There is no guarantee anywnere that even the present Government has not been suborned into such undertakings, when the disclosure is made, that the late Government undertook lines that wore so bad that tboy have been abandoned though partly constructed. Of course there is no guarantee that the Ward Government is in this matter any better than the Seddon Government. If. it were any better, the Midland Railway would not be eating up the public-funds. Nor is there any, guarantee that Mr. M'Kenzie, who so utterly discouraged the people of Central Otago, is wholly de-. serving of the praise that is given him in the Mail's article. "May we not," asks the Mail, "reckon ourselves fortunate to have an administrator who determines that no 'wild-cat' proposals shall be submitted to Parliament and runs all risks of consequent unpopularity?" Yes; we may, and we shall—when the gentleman concerned runs the risk of unpopularity in the place where unpopularity will affect him most. In other words, we shall applaud Mr. M'Kenzie unreservedly as soon as' we hear that he has decided not to countenance the further construction of the Westport-Reefton line. The M.P. who denounces the atrocities in Bulgaria may be justified, but he does not strike us as being necessarily a just and courageous man; we like better the man who denounces the atrocities in his own parish.