THE PUBLIC WORKS WRANGLF

Dominion, Volume 7, Issue 1925, 6 December 1913, Page 4

THE PUBLIC WORKS WRANGLF

_—. e Yesterday in the House of lteprcscntatives was Riven over to the £ annual wrangle on the Public Works ~ votes for the current financial year. The Leader of the Opposition led 8 off with great spirit, and was in better form than he has shown for s quite 'a- long time past. He be--1 laboured the Government with cvis dent enjoyment, stimulated no doubt fc by the recollection of the many occar sions in the past on which ho had , been subjected to a similar ordeal it from the gentlemciMiow on the Trea- [• sury benches. His generalisations ! were more effective than the definite i instances he ventured to quote in 3 support of 'his criticism of the ad--3 ministration of the Public Works 5 Fund. The Minister of Finance, who i followed, made some of Bui Joseph fc Ward's assertions look rather foolish fc in the light of the facts, adduced, as 1 will be seen, from the report pubb lished' in another column. Mr. ; Ali.en appeared in quite a new role, i and bantered his opponents to such i effect that he drew from the Opposi--1 tion' benches a constant fire of ex- - planations. It was all vcrv good- : humoured, and the honours" rested 3 easily with the Minister. The methi ods of voting Public Works eX- ■ pendittirc practised here for so many • years past afford an opportunity for i reform of a very important and fars reaching nature. They are bad in ! every way. For one thing, the sysi tem pursued naturally encourages ; the introduction of political inilu- ■ ences in the allocation of money for : roads, bridges, public buildings', etc, ■ The Hcform Government may endeavour to eliminate political coni aiderations in apportioning expendi- ■ ture, but it will never receive credit from its opponents for having done i so. But apart from this consideration, what qualifications do members of Parliament possess for deciding whether or not the proposed items of expenditure submitted for'their approval are justified and in the interests of the general taxpayer 1 Absolutely none. There arc hundreds and hundreds of votes on the Estimates about which members know absolutely nothing—probably no one outside the Minister and tho member for the district have over heard of many of the places where it is pronosed that money shall be expended, thus it means that a lari?e part of the expenditure is to all intents and purposes entirely in the hands of th > Minister, and without any possibility of a proper check as to its justification. , This is an old grievance of ours, but it is a very real one. What-' ever Government may be in power itis undesirable that this state of tilings should be allowed to continue. We should like to sec this expenditure allocated by a competent, . disinterested, non-political board. In connection with fufcuro railway development the Government might with advantage consider the question of setting up a Commission or Board of Experts to fro into the whole question, and see if it is not advisable to lay down' some general policy of construction. For voars a haphazard policy has been pursued, largely influenced by political considerations, and it certainly has not been in the best interests of the | Dominion. j