THE BOYCOTT EXPOSED.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 864, 9 July 1910, Page 4

THE BOYCOTT EXPOSED.

A Parliamentary return laid before the House of . Representatives yesterday contains a quite remarkable exposure of the methods of the Ward Government. The return in question shows the distribution of Government advertising during the past year. Our readers, and in fact practically the whole country, arc now well aware of the manner in which Ministers have abused their power in this matter of State advertisements in order, to penalise this journal for its independent and outspoken criticism of the Government's maladministration. Under tho pretence .of economy they have systematically boycotted The Dominion, and spent the money which they hold in trustfor the people of New Zealand in journals which in the matter of circulation cannot return more than a fraction of the value which is to be derived from advertising in this paper. This is a matter of common knowledge. We venture to think that there is not one member _of the House of Representatives _ today, if indeed there is a single person iii the whole of New Zealand, familiar with the circumstances, who honestly believes that the Ward Government would be boycotting The Dominion at thb present moment if the paper supported the party in power. That the Government should thus dare to openly flout public opinion is a most disquieting and dangerous indication of the lengths to which it is prepared to go, not merely in this matter but in other directions. If public _ funds are openly misspent in this way what is going on behind the scenes—what discrimination is being made there 1 Will the Auckland members of Parliament who support the Government say that the newspaper t'Saturday Night affords a better medium of advertising than The Dominion I Will Wellington members say that the Free Lance can possibly give a return equal to that given by The Dominion ? Is - Truth ■ more deserving in the eyes of Sir Joseph Ward than The Dominion? Will Mr. G. W. Russell, member" for Avon, say <hat The Spectator, published weekly in Christchurch, is entitled to twelve times the amount of State advertising given to The Dominion, published daily in Wellington ? _ But it is not really necessary to go into details. The figures of the Parliamentary return, which will be found in another column, speak for themselves to anyone who knows anything of the press of New Zealand. Moreover, the merits of the matter do not weigh with the Government in the slightest. Last session the following motion was moved in . the House of Representatives:—

"That in the opinion of this House Government advertisements should bo supplied to newspapers regardless of their political convictions, and witli a view only to secur-

ing the best return to tho taxpayers for the money so expended.' Of the 56 members, present when the division was'takei},.36, including all tho members of the voted against the principle embodied in tlio motion. In other words, 36 members of the Government party—the whole of those in'attendance at the time—openly rejected the principle that Government' advertising should be distributed so as to secure the best return for the money expended, and refused.to affirm the view that political considerations should not be regarded in the expenditure of public money. We do not think the country has yet so completely surrendered itself to the methods of Wardisin to submit tamely to this wilful flouting of all the canons of sound and honest government. If the boycott of The Dominion has served to give the country some reasonable idea of the lengths to which the Ward Administration is prepared to go in disregarding the public interest so as to serve its own ends, then we shall feel that we, have been well repaid for such cost as wo have been put to in asserting and maintaining a proper independence of Ministerial influence.