WELLINGTON NOTES.

Hokitika Guardian, 16 July 1917, Page 1

WELLINGTON NOTES.

an INOPPORTUNE MOVE. MB. MoCOMBS AGAIN. (Our Special Correspondent) WELLINGTON, July 13. The strangely perverted kind of egotism which possesses, the mein her lor Lyttelton has again asserted itself at a singularly inopportune moment. Just as the more progressive members of. the old Liberal Party, reinforced by a number less spirits from the other side of polities, were framing an amendnont to the Address-in-Ileply based oil broad democratic principles. Air. McCombs has rushed in with a challenge to the Government on the one unassailable feature of its defence policy. Had be wished to fortify Sir James Allen and,bis colleagues against the attack of the other conspirators;lie scarcely could have served them better. There are plenty of people complaining of the administration of the Defence Department of its extravagance, waste, inefficiency and the rest, but there is only an individual here and there iinding ia'ult with the Determination of the Minister to discharge to the full tlie Dominion’s obligations to the Empire. Vet this is the issue on which Mr. -McCombs Ims chosen to throw down the gage of battle to the National Cabinet . u Of courser his little demonstration will be ignored by the public just as it is being ignored by the Government, and the pity of it an is that a man of his ability should lie wasting his talents on such futile displays. THE MAN SUPPLY. ft must not be assumed, however,, that Air. McCombs is the only member of Parliament who looks with disfavour upon, the continual drafts upon the man •supply of tlie country. Even in the Legislative Council, where one does /not look for any departure from the accepted creeds and traditions, there are occasional inn mm rings against the exacting demands of Imperialism. The Hon. I. D. Ormond, tvho took his seat in the Council for the first time this session, Yesterday, seized the earliest opportunity to express his dissent from the policy of the Government. He thought New Zealand should not keep' up its present large reinforcements and he predicted there would be an expression of opinion in the country entirely, averse to the administration of the Defence. Department. In the House there are a' score of men talking in the same strain and perhaps half as many again leaving their thoughts unspoken. But the Alinister of Defence will not budge one jot from bis original programme and apparently-, lie has- the full support of his colleagues in his determination. The statement lie made in the House on Tuesday night, though it supplied Air. AfeCqmhs with most of the 'material for his attack, was really a very stirring appeal to the patriotism of the country and it was made to neither deaf nor unapprepiative ears. SMOULDERING DISCONTENT If there should be a serious attack upon the Government before the conelusion of the debate on t,he Address-in-Repl.v it will lie based not upon Sir James Allen’s refusal to listen to the •little New Zealanders, as he would call them, who would have him stay his hand in regard to the dispatch of Reinforcements, but upon a score of minor delinquencies which have grown into crimes as the age of the Ministry pro grossed. First of all there is the ndli’jinidtrnfion °f the Defence; Department, which in some respect’s has been deplorably slack and ineffective. Probably*'the Minister is less to blame for what luis happened than areiiis responsible officers, but lie has shouldered the full responsibility for. -the defects and the failures and will, he judged accordingly. Then there is the timidity of the Government in regard to the cost of living. It may have Tnwi impossible for Ministers to keep the prices down, but it is urged to their disadvantage they have made no sustained effort to do so. In this connection it i& pointed out that the Prime Alinister, by extracting the last ftp-tiling from the Imperial authorities for meat and butter and cheese, has added substantially to the pi-ices of those commodities in New Zealand. These are the domestic affairs which make and unmake Governments much more frequently than do big questions of foreign policy..