GOVERNMENT IN BUSINESS

Hokitika Guardian, 25 August 1928, Page 1

GOVERNMENT IN BUSINESS

BACK IN THE SEVENTIES. (

ACCMULATED TROUBLES.

(Nineteen Twenty-Eight Committee.) It cannot he repeated too frequently, in justice to the present Government, that Mr Coates and his colleagues are not responsible for the accumulation of legislation of a more or less socialistic character appearing on the Statute Cook to-day. When the Public Trust Office Act—regarded by some people as the first germ of socialism to afflict the politics of this country—was passed in 1872, the Prime Minister was not even born. The Minister of Finance, the Minister of Lands, the Minister of Justice, the Minister of Health, the Minister ol' Public Works and the Minister for Cook Islands were all in the same case. The Postmaster-General was but a todlcr of five, the Minister of Labour had not yet entered his teens, the Minister of Agriculture was still playing marbles and the Minister of Education was laying aside his utopian heresies, while the present Leader of tile Legislative Council had not yet reached man’s estate. Twenty years later, when the promoters of a long sustained wave of experimental legislation were being denounced ns tho “Seven Devils of Socialism,” Sir Francis Roll was the member of tho present Cabinet in the House and it is needless to say he had not thrown in his lot with tho new evangel. The Hon. G\ T. Anderson and the Hon. R,. A. Wright entered the House some six or seven years later, but they had no opportunity to stay the course of speculative legislation.

PRESENT RESPONSIBILITIES, It is plain therefore that the members of the present Cabinet are in no way answerable for what happened in this respect before 1911 when the Reform Government look office and accepted the responsibilities appertaining to both legislation and administration. Technically Air Coates and his colleagues may he responsible only for what they have done and what they have left updone since they' look up the burden Mr Massey laid down rather more than three years ago. It may bo assumed, however, that they will accept the obligation bequeathed to them by their former leader and that having had ample time to review tho whole situation will not allow the present session to closo without at least clearing tlio Statute Book of the flagrant array of incongruities left to the country by the war and its aftermath. Perhaps the most glaring of these incongruities are embodied in tho Cost of Living Act, which remains intact seven- of eight years after tho disappearance of every' possible occasion for its existence. This measure provides that the Government may fix prices and wages as it pleases, may suppress any industry it considers prejudicial to any other industry ; may assume absolute control of

any private enterprise and may ruin any individual who ventures to contest its authority'. To retain these provisions on the Statute Book in anything like their present form would bo an insult to tbe "self-respect and intelligence of tbe whole community. DEPARTMENTAL INTERFERENCE. Apart from the drastic amendment of such measures as the Cost of Living Act, the Government should bo looking closely into the administration of various departments of State, which, without any legislative authority, appear to be trespassing more and more upon tlio legitimate domains of private enterprise with no tangible advantage either to the individual or to the public. The Public Works Department provides many instances of this kind of tiling. It has become- the practice of the Department to- do all construction work itself without regard to the interests of the public or jto the rights of those engaged in engineering and contracting operations. Tho Department estimates the approximate cost oft a-n undertaking without making any allowance for overhead charges, for income tax, for duties on imported material, for inevitable additions to award rates of wages, or for many other items of incidental expenditure. Obviously' no engineering or building firm can compete successfully against opposition of this kind, though it is known that in the great majority of cases the cost of construction by the Department is substantially greater than would he the cost by a reputable firm of contractors. A similar state of affairs prevails in many other departments and even in tho o|ierations of local bodies which involve the expenditure of large sums of public money, thus, not only superseding private e.ngi- 1 neors and contractors, but also adding materially to the burdens of the tax-! payers. i