PUBLIC EXPENDITURE.

Hokitika Guardian, 14 June 1927, Page 1

PUBLIC EXPENDITURE.

HOW THE MONEY GOES.

NEED FOB INFORMATION. (“ Taxpayer ”) The Prime .Minister recently announced liis intention to set up a special committee consisting of well-known Government officials to examine the departmental proposals for next jeai s expenditure with a view to effecting reductions wherever possible without impairing the efficiency of the services concerned. The underlying idea of the scheme is admirable. The Minister of Finance is far too busy a man to give his personal attentioin to every item on the Estimates, while the members of the Public Accounts’ Committee, sitii ng only when Patliament is in session. may find it extremely difficult t. maintain an entirely disinterested attitude towards proposals for lessening public, expenditure. Whether or not a special committee composed of wcllknon Government officials, would be better able than the .Minister himself or the Public Accounts Committee to discharge such an extremely delicate and difficult task as the‘one Air Coates is contemplating would depend largely upon its constitution. Forty odd years ago the Government of the day, in response to an insistent pulHfc outcry 7

“retrenchment,” appointed a Civil Service Commission to enquire into the organisation and expenditure of the various State departments, selecting commissioners of proved integrity r. known business ability, and the net result of its scathing report was a ieduction of 10 per cent, all round in the wages and salaries of all civil servants, irrespective of grade and service, a palpably harsh and unjust proceeding which cost several of its members the seats they had occupied in Parliament. Theoretically, of course, the duty of watching and checking the public expenditure rests with the members of the House of Representatives, hut. as a plain matter of fact, the system of “party discipline” has been converted into so fine an art that it is only a small minority of the Opposition, for the time being, that thinks it necessary or even desirable to investigate at all closely the minutiae of the Government’s financial operations. SOAIE EXAMPLES. This being the case it may not lie out of place on the eve of another meeting of Parliament to mention two or three matters associated with the Government’s finance which appear to require further elucidation. In the absence of any later detailed information it will bo necessary to take as a basis the Estimates for the financial year 1926-27 which wore submitted to the House of Representatives oil July Oth. and finally carried through committee, in smaller or larger instalments often at express speed, on September 10th. The Supplementary Estimatefollowed at accelerated speed, being the vehicle, as from time immemorial, f the passage of rotes hearing more or less resemblance to the notorious “Washing-Up’’ Bill and members’ responsibilities in this respect for another year wore deemed to lie fully •discharged. Among the items of expenditure authorised were several applying to the administration of tho Dominion’s big services. One of those items, to take an example almost at random, was a vole of £15.000 for “overtime and meals’’ for the staff of the Department. Tt was explained in a marginal note that the yearly inerea.se in this vote was due Lo the growth of business; lint a reference to previous appropriations under this heading shows that in 1015-10 the com pa rat ivclv modest sum of £13.000 was sufficient to satisfy the demands for “overtime and meals.” Areamvhilo the staff of the Department had increased from 5,961 persons in 1015 to 8,-120 in 1020. the number of telegrams dispatched from 0,872.050 to 7,225.015 and the mini her of letters, letter cards, post-cards, books, parcels and newspapers delivered approximately by 80 millions. These figures need not suggest that the increase in the staff was unnecessary, hut they leave the increase from £13,000 to £.15.000 in the vote for “overtime and meals” unexplained. It is only fair to repeat, however, that they are taken from H*'latest returns available to the public and may be subject to some revision when further returns are produced. OTHER AIATTERS. Then there were quite a number of other items of considerable magnitude in the Estimates for tho financial year just closed which seem to have been endorsed by the JTousc. in “committee of supply,” without enquiry or comment. A sum of £70.003 is set down for motors, motor lorries and motor cycles. This, it must be admitted, is a mere trifle in an approprriation of some thirty millions; but many people, professing to be acquainted with the uses to which the vehicles are put, declare that the services in which they are employed could be carried on efficiently at a cost of not more than two-thirds of the amount of last year's vote. There is no need to quibble over the use made of the vehicles for private purposes—that would be a comparative trifle in any case—but if may be suggested to the responsible Minister that iv niiglit be worth bis while asccitaining from a competent independent authority if that £23.000 or £24.000 could be saved bv adopting the up-to-date methods and discipline of private enterprise. So fur private enterprise appears to he getting the bettei of State control and in many branches of transport and perhaps the Government's motors, motor lorries, and motor cycles might provide an opportunity for learning definitely why this is the rase. There is another item in last year's appropriations which particularly concerns members of Parliament and which necessarily must ho mentioned with bated breath. Free railway passes to the members . of both Houses of Parliament, their wives and their relatives, cost the taxpayers, it appears, no less than £24..05, an average of over £2OO a year for each member. It is conceded by everyone that members oT Parliament should learn bv travel as much as they can of the needs and potentialities of the country they assist in governing; hut surelv in the discharge of this duty free passages for themselves would be a sufficient inspiration so far as the public purse was concerned.

THE AY AY OUT. These observations are not intended as an impeachment of the present Government or of any previous Government. They deal with a condition of affairs which has grown up during a long series of years as a result of widespread apathy concerning the administration of various State departments. Once in every three years the electors are stirred into some sort of enthusiasm for a month or two by the activities of the contending political parties, but when the general election

is over they relapse into their old state of somnolence, content, it would scorn, that the party in office should do its worst or its best, as the case mac be. until another appeal to the constituencies conies round. The Labour Party, ns at present constituted, provides the inevitable exception to this general rule. It maintains its activities from one triennial period to another, without abating its enthusiasms or its efforts one jot, and always keeping its platform and precepts before the public. As its influence rarely is cast on the side of economy, however, its activities can be ol little assistance to the taxpayer, be bis burden great or small. What is wanted in the politics of this country more Ilian anything else at the present iime is an alert public that would divest itself of mere party prejudice and insist upon its representatives in Parliament serving the interests of the Dominion as the directors of a. great mercantile company are expected to serve the interests of its shareholders. It is the limit ol successive Alinistries and of an apathetic public that such a system of administration has not yet been initiated in ibis country. The present Government, with a leader that dares to do tilings, with a Alinister of Finance in vision and understanding the peer of any of his predecessors, and with a majority almost unprecedented in the strife between the parties, has an exceptional opportunity to repair the existing defects in the government machine, and to lead the country back to sound financial and administrative methods.