The Dominion WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1919. PROMISES MADE TO BE BROKEN

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 65, 10 December 1919, Page 6

The Dominion WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1919. PROMISES MADE TO BE BROKEN

i All necessary proof that Sir Joseph V\ai:d rates the intelligence of the people of New Zealand very low is to be found in the speech he delivered at Martinborough on Monday evening. First and last it was marked by a studied avoidance of concrete facts and an eagerness to, make any promise, however wild, that he thought likely to tickle the ears of the electors and catch their votes. Particularly in what ho had to say about public works he turned his back on realities and prattled away in a fashion only to be likened to that of a child building castles in Spain. The hard-head-erl Wairarapa settlers and townsmen to whom lie spoke must have been more than a little amused at the airy fashion in which he solved the problems of road and railway const-ruction and hydro-electric development by word of mouth. They must have been not a little disgusted, too, to think that any politician should deem it possible to take them in with such beggarly electioneering. No doubt they were crateful for the assurance that their own little line could be completed in six or nine months. This presumably was intended as a joke, but it is on a par with what Sin Joseph "Wakd had to say about rail-way-construction in general, and other forms of public works. Absurdity is too mild a .word to describe his statement that "in three years we Inust finish all the authorised railways in this country." Any one who thinks for a- moment of the hundreds of miles of railways authorised, but yet unbuilt—railways, some of them, surveyed through imraensnlv _ difficult country—may weigh this statement for himself. Tfc is worth weighing, not so much for the sake of exposing its absurd extravagance as because it affords a standard by which to measure the. political'sincerity of the Leader of the. Opposition and his sense of responsibility.

The truth, of course, is that it would be utterly impossible to complete in three years all the railways authorised in the Dominion, even if the maximum labour force likely to lie available were multiplied several times over. The existing position as regards the supply of labour and in other respects is such that, it will be a year or two at least, irrespective of what Government mav bo in office, before it will be possible to attain the pace of railway construction that was attained iji years of good progress .before the war. When the last Public Works Statement was presented, only a month or two ago, the number of men in the employ of the Public Works Denartment was fully fifteen hundred below the pre-war mark. This is the noint from which a beginning must be made, and it is, of course, a very material point that railways are not the only works to be considered. H vdro-eloctric development alone, if it is passed forward as it ought to be, will occupy the energies of many hundreds of men as soon as fch'\v cap be obtained and keep t'H'm stead il" emploved for years to come. Ttoad construction and improvement vorks also will afford work foi- many hundreds of men for a mueh lonsrer period Iban three years. .. Moreover, in addition to the cons) ruction of new vtii 1 vs. a place must be found in the list of urgent undertakings to lie put in hand at (be earliest possible moment for swell improvement works ;is the Ti.imutakn, and Paekakariki deviations. It is a ivty that no one at the Martinborough meeting asked Sin Joseph W\nn how long lie would take to complete the Rimutaka deviation. Presumably he would have promised to puf it through in fifteen 'months. The actual position is that with such, ebn'ms as are to be faced a steadv inflow of immigration and all possible enterprise on the nart of the Government of the day will be needed to ensure larvthinir lib.** a satisfactory ra'e of nron-yess in developmental work.

Tf Joseph W.vjmk ins Kid of beinp; intent solely on the ehoanest tvpe of clpntinmWinir. aimed at. a, genuine nol'C" of nroj/reyt! f|n v/nii ].'' take a very different tone Instead of nirilv rtroniisinjr aob.iev n nienK which. if ho has troubled to think about them "t all, he must kmv to lie imnoss''de. lie would admit 1 lint, handie.ins a.nd difficulties exist and show how best they are to he overprimp ]t would he the viart of honest statesu'.ansh'ii. for instance, tt. suf.ce'est flint with such heavy and coiillictiiifr claims to be met, ranid progress is unlikely while public, works are the subject of nolit'fal harsr.iinint; and comi»romisc ' and that. I'he wise course in the interests of the country would be to hand them over to a non-pji'it ; "a! board, or board*, to be carried out in a businesslike, way-. Evidently, however, the T.""der of" th° O'nmsiHop is nut at all concerned nraet.i'»s>l nuesH'ons of this ki»d. Fe i« concerned only about votw., and so is content to turn away from the fncts of the case and talk r-'i'i nov|,iurr;.* nlifiiil comiih'tinu- al' : h" nu•borised railways in the country in (Ip-o(> vea v s, and orde'-inf at. once

"the machinery for all t l '" waterpowpr schemes, in the v.-ho!" coimtrv." To all v.'lio are st'OViently alert to note and consider such nonsensical the Leader of tii" O'vw.iti.on will stand out plainly in hi? real character as a politician who is con tent mi the eve of an el"(lion to make tilt: nn>-t reekli.f.G rei'Mof the laet !hat fJi'-ir fulfilment is imnossible. 811: -losvi'i' W.\i:n has no h.ope of obtaining (lie support of those who

consider and rcllect. His appeal is to unthinking people whom lie expects to be swept away by empty words. There was a lime when such tactics might have served, but the people of the Dominion are much less likely to-day than they were in easier times to accept electioneering shams in place of realities. They are not unaware that the politician who promises anything and everything is least of all fitted to render honest and useful service.