COMING EVENTS. Hokitika Guardian & Evening Star MONDAY, NOVEMBER 26th, 1917. A PRESSING NEED.

Hokitika Guardian, 26 November 1917, Page 2

COMING EVENTS.

Hokitika Guardian & Evening Star MONDAY, NOVEMBER 26th, 1917. A PRESSING NEED.

i'mc ten per cent rise in railway rates is now in force. It can he well undcrlood, with the tremendous out-goings or this Great War, that money is a messing need, and there being this necessity the Government are well within their rights in re-charging /the .•offers. An enterprising pressman sought representative public opinion on the matter, and Mr J. A. Frostick, the Canterbury Commissioner of the National Efficiency Board, who doo s not hide his light under a bushel when tin* public press as available, was called upon. According to the comment of the reporter. Mr Eros tick “put the luestion in a nutshell” when he referred to (hi the subject. “The Government wants the money,’’ he remarked, “and it must have it.” If Mr Frostick had not said so we would not have accepted the statement as a truism, seeing that in the management of the New Zealand railways thousands of pounds of easily collected revenue are being refused and not catered for week hv week. But that is by tlie way. Mr. Frostick proceeds:—“These are abnormal times and it- would ill become anyone to criticise the Government in raising the necessary funds for it to carry on.” Just so, the dear old Government through its Departments may go on mismanaging the internal administration, and nobody «uay say one word of protest, certainly no one does! Then comes this gem from Mr. Frostick: “Of course tho rise will increase the cost of living—that seems inevitable.” How pleasant, hut yet no hurdle for the dear old Government, which when its employees clamour loud enough again, will go one better, by doling out another and further bonus to meet the increased cost of living, and so the piling on process wall continue to the end of the chapter But the chapter might have its appropriate climax sooner than expected. There are more than rumblings to be heard anent the prospective Wellington North Election, and that event might have a n eye-opening effect on our sleepy Government methods in ,internal administration. There are evidences °n all sides of the mismanagement of the railways whereby revenue is lost, trade dislocated and the public victimised by reason of the crass methods under which railways traffic is at present directed. The Minister of Finance has been visiting his fair Southland, and as the one man of the Government who “wants the money” most, to which Mr. IFrosticlc referred, has had his eyes onened to another ."hanuel throi' nr h which revenue L. being lost. Tho reinstatement of the Christchurch-Inver-cargill express train wa's impressed on the Minister of Finance at Tnvereargill by the Southland Chamber of Commerce. Sir Joseph Ward said if the "Minister of Railways, in ooninuetion with the important, resnonsibilitv devolving noon him. could re-establish the through express it would give a great, nocessiotn of business to tho Railway Department. They all wanted to help the Government of the country at this time but they also wanted to

hsip the.country through the Govern* ment. Mail services should not bo greatly inconvenienced through train dislocations even during war time. Business people in us tl have business connection with other centres. He pro- , mised to bring the deputation’s representations before the Hon. W. 11. Herries and would ask for reconsideration so far as the through train and mail connections were concerned. It -was almost vital that Southland should bo able to carry on trade with other

centres. What Sir Joseph said of his | beloved Southland applies with equal force to neglected Westland, which is without champion at court to get the ear of the Hon. W. H. Herrjes. There is something sadly wrong with the railway management when it turns away business which is assuredly profitable, and in lieu therefore adds to the impost put upon the people and their trading to make good the loss. It all seems like a game of cross purposes. On the one hand we have Mr. Herries responsible for the stupid administration and on the other Mr. Frostick of the so-called Efficiency Board submitting to the cost of living going up in such a nefarious manner because it would “all become anyone, to criticise,” while the Minister of Finance is content to express a few platitudes over a matter which “would give a great accession of business to the Railway Department,” and obviate the impost and the increase in the cost of living Truly, we are playing at the Government of the country while our own “Rome is burning.”