Hawke's Bay Times. NAPIER, FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 1863.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume III, Issue 147, 6 November 1863, Page 2

Hawke's Bay Times. NAPIER, FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 1863.

The Herald, in one of those pithy leaders for which that celebrated journal is deservedly remarkable, calls upon the good people of Hawke's Bay to join with him in a general Jubilate upon the good fortune which has fallen upon them in the acceptance by Mr. Weber of the Chief Surveyorship. We, however, cannot join in this feeling

of satisfaction which it would seem ought to be expressed upon the occasion in question ; nor do we think that the people generally will be lead to express much satisfaction either upon the subject. Not upon the ground of Mr. Weber in a merely professional point of view having accepted the office to which we refer, for no doubt he is eminently fitted for it, but upon the just ground that whether he be fitted for it or not it is quite beyond our most sanguine expectations that, in combination with the duties of Provincial Engineer, he can properly do the work required of him. It is not required of the Government to endeavor to get impossibilities done. It is uot required by the electors of this Province that their Government should, with a false notion of economy, cram as much work under one head as that Government can devise. In this particular case, one or other of the offices held by Mr. Weber is superfluous. Either the Chief Surveyorship or the Provincial Engineershlp is by implication, if not in fact, a useless office. We however, not being up to official mysteries, beyond a pretty general conviction as to the abominable corruption and jobbery by which those mysteries are surrounded, are of opinion that neither of these offices are offices which can with safety or with prudence be set aside. On the score of economy we most emphatically repudiate the annexation. There is uo economy in doing anything haJly. The most false economy conceivable is that of attempting to do too much with a limited sum of money. Further, any attempt to obtain shelter under that little covering is completely negatived by the fact that the Government have tried every conceivable dodge known to them—and the name of those dodges is legion—to get the Chief Surveyorship filled. All the four quarters of the Island have been ransacked to find a fitting man, before the economical idea presented itself of knocking the Chief Surveyorship into the Provincial Engineership ; therefore it is but too plainly demonstrated by the facts before us that our friend the Herald as usual, is altogether wrong.

Again and in further support of our position, we have to draw attention to the significant fact of a Paymaster of Roads being suddenly found necessary. We recollect very well that that particular member of His Honor’s Executive who fills the seat for Porangahau was the man who originally knocked the office of Paymaster of Roads on the head, and thereby reduced the then occupant of that respectable sinecure to the painful necessity of turning his hand to something else. Nor should we forget that, beyond a few insignificant jobs going on, the Public Works are not in an active state. However, they never are in an active state, so that the present state of matters is not unusual. The state of all public works and Government undertakings generally is eminently passive , —in fact that way of putting the case has become a bye word, and is knowm amongst men as “Government stroke.’’ We regret very much that Mr. Weber should have accepted this new appointment; that gentleman stood high in public estimation as an active, conscientious public servant. We know that he cannot possibly do what is required of him ; it is beyond the limits of human powers. And still more unfortunate for that gentleman that the praises of the Herald lavished upon any public officer at once act with a withering and deadly influence upon that unhappy man. He is no longer looked upon as other than a Government back, and not a public servant. His days are thenceforth numbered. But apart from the fitness or unfitness of the duties required of Mr. Weber, this matter takes the very serious aspect of being a most illegal act. The Provincial Government is proceeding in a manner which at once ignores the authority of the representatives of the people. We contend that, even admitting that Mr. Weber can do all the

work wanted of him, and that a Paymaster of Roads is required, the Superintendent has no more right to make those appointments without first getting the sanction of the Council than we have. Mr. McLean’s course of procedure in official matters is so entirely a copy of the proceedings of his great prototype Sir G. Grey, that we are not surprised to see him acting thus. But as Sir G. Grey is the acme of all conceivable jobbing, he is unfortunately a very bad original from which to take a copy, and we should have been delighted if Mr. McLean could have found some better model. But this is impossible in official matters (particularly in relation to appointments) ; Mr. Me Lean is pre-eminent for a disregard of all law or order. We have, however, strong hopes that this corrupt state of things cannot last .much longer ; a reaction will presently take place, and down will fall the celebrated McLean, amidst the applause of all right-thinking men, and the dismal wailings of the ghost of the defunct. Herald.