WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Hokitika Guardian, 17 March 1917, Page 3

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Military Service.

Advice by the Minister.

(Our Spacial Correspondent.)

Wellington, March 14.

The Acting Plime Minister, as chairman of the Recruiting Board, is urging farmers drawn in the ballot not to leave their laud idle while they are away at the war. Cases have been brought under his notice in which farmers “ are selling oft their stock and shutting up their properties ” rather than make appeals to the Military Serv.ice Board for exemption, or application to the National Efficiency Board for advice and assistance. Sir James Allen, impressed, no doubt, by representations that have been made to him throughout the country, is very much in earnest about this matter, and wishes it to be widely known that the Government regards the production of foodstuffs in war time as a national necessity of the first importance. He has not suggested that every farmer who appeals will be excused from service, but he has implied that the need for keeping the farms going will be very sympathetically considered. The Workers’ Case. The workers generally are not disposed to complain of special consideration being extended to farmers and farm labourers in the matter of exemption from military service, but they claim, apparently with some reason, that there are numbers of men engaged in other industries just as essential as the primary producers are to the welfare of the Dominion and the Empire. The railwaymen, the carters, the watersiders and the seamen, they instance, all have a hand in getting the products of the country to their destination, and are as well entitled to special consideration as are the men who own the land and the hands they directly employ. The larger questions of keeping the worker’s home going and his job open while he is at the front follow as a matter of course, but their discussion leads to more intricate problems than can be even stated here. ' Dr. McNab’s Successor. The popular assumption that Sir John Findlay’s election to the Hawkes Bay seat in the House of Representatives would be followed by the new member’s appointment to the National Cabinet has not yet been justified by any official announcement. It is quite incredible, however, that both Mr Massey and Sir Joseph Ward would have been so eager to secure Sir John’s return, or that Sir John would have been so ready to make the personal sacrifices Uia election entails if it were intended

ho should sit merely as a private member. Ministers decline to give any information on the subject and Sir John is equally reticent, but it is still taken for granted by the public that the successor to Dr McNab’s seat will be also the successor to his ministerial responsibilities. The final decision, of course, will come from London, and possibly it will be delayed till sometime nearer the meeting of Parliament.

A Lesson For. Local Bodies,

'The chairman of the Westport Harbour Board has been in Wellington for some days in connection with a little trouble which has arisen between the Board and the Audit Department and which furnishes a useful lesson for local bodies generally. In the course of re-organising its staff a year or so ago the 'Hoard relieved some of the officers that had gone grey in its service and paid them retiring allowances with the full approbation of its constituents. Bat instead of employing the subterfuge of granting them leave of absence on pay and engaging other men to do their work, it frankly terminated tlieir engagements, and now the Audit Department, in strict accordance with the law, is holding the members personally liable for the refund of the allowances. The chairman’s tactful representations may be followed by some measure of relief, but meanwhile the law’s preference for round-about methods has to be vindicated.

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