NOTES AND COMMENTS
The grievance of Mr. Langstone, who is resigning both bls High Commissioiiership in Canada and his Ministerial association with the Government because he was not entrusted with the post of New Zealand Minister in Washington, appears to he largely personal. This being so it is of little importance. The thing that matters in any administrative sphere is the national welfare, flflie Prime Minister has explained that although he had it in mind to offer the Washington post to Mr, Langstone at the conclusion of the latter’s trade mission, the subsequent change in the Pacific war situation caused the Government to decide to appoint a b"etter-inforined man. 'This is a perfectly reasonable explanation, and no doubt everyone save Mr. Langstone himself will see the force of it and be satisfied. There is, however, another side to the matter —that concerning the Ottawa appointment, which Mr. Langstone has spurned and proposes to abandon after accepting it for a three-year term. Tlie High Commissionership in Canada is an office of considerable importance, selection for which called for dispassionate discrimination among the best men available for the post. Any idea of it having been regarded or treated as a second prize, or political sop, would be most disturbing to the public. Mr. Fraser has said in his statement that after learning that Mr. Langstone resented not being appointed Minister to Washington, he immediately informed Mr. Langstone of an intended suggestion to Cabinet in respect to the High Commissionership. This “suggestion” was adopted, but the country is not told why. Surely it was realized that there was more to this key appointment than merely an attempt to placate a disgruntled member of the Government who happened, as a result of his trade mission, to be handy to the spot?
Of late years, whenever the Government was preparing to change front in a labour dispute, it has become what is now regarded as the established practice to assert, more or less emphatically, that the whole trouble had been caused by a few men, a mere handful. There was one dispute affecting several hundred men in which the Prime Minister contended that 99 per cent, of them were anxious to do the right thing and assist the national effort. The number of Coal-mining troubles that have been attributed to a small section, a few men, is already fairly substantial, so that the head of the Government caused no surprise when, during the debate in Parliament, he said that “the men were misled by a few.” What puzzles many people is how it so often comes about that a few men, among hundreds, always seem able to promote industrial disputes that adversely affect all of them. It has been said that the strike at Huntly cost the miners about £25,000 in wages lost, so that those few men were responsible for 'a lot. Why is it not possible for the others, the great majority, to direct the course of events? If 99 per cent, of a big body of workmen are ready and willing to continue working, how does it come about that the odd man per hundred gets them to stop? What caused the Huntly miners to allow the few to mislead them? These are among the many questions that have presented themselves to the minds of many people, and they appear to have been outside the range of the Ministerial reviews so far.
The announcement by the Minister of Social Security (Mr. Parry) that the relaxation of conditions under which State age pensions are granted has resulted in a number of beneficiaries accenting employment makes welcome reading. But it does not lessen the force of the plea for more generous concession during the period of the war emergency. On the contrary it supports that plea. If some pensioners- hare already come forward for war work on the understanding that they may resume their social security benefits as soon as their employment ceases, then many more may be expected to make their services available to .‘.lie community if in doing so they were not required to surrender their pensions even temporarily. As has previously been emphasized in this column, the work most old-age pensioners are capable of doing is unlikely to command more than a very modest wage. This being so, the deduction from the worker’s income of the amount of his pension is likely to leave him with a meagre reward for his services. To permit a worker-pensioner to retain his pension, during the emergency period, irrespective of the amount of his earnings would be an encouraging gesture, not only one costing the Social Security Department nothing but actually adding to its revenue. Moreover, by all appearances, it would add appreciably to the number of those veterans who are prepared to emerge from retirement and lend the community a hand.
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Dominion, Volume 36, Issue 20, 19 October 1942, Page 4
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807NOTES AND COMMENTS Dominion, Volume 36, Issue 20, 19 October 1942, Page 4
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