The Oamaru Mail. FRIDAY, JUNE 18, 1880.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1310, 18 June 1880, Page 2

The Oamaru Mail. FRIDAY, JUNE 18, 1880.

The resignation of Sir Julius Vogel of the Agent-Generalship is not altogether an un-looked-for event. For a long time it has been looked ttpon as a contingency likely to arise at any moment, for it was very generally known that neither the past nor the present Ministry approved of his connection •with speculative companies and his efforts to enter the Imperial Parliament. - The publicationof correspondencethathaspassed between the Government and the Agent-General fully bears out the rumors that for months have been rife that there was an unquestionable dispute between the Ministry and Sir Julius Yogel. Upon the nature of that correspondence it is not our present intention to comment at any length ; but there is just one point to which we would like to refer briefly. Sir Julius "Vogel bases his claim to consideration for the inscription of the five million loan upon the very great services that he has performed for the Colony. This is somewhat cool, but the proposition that he should receive a commission upon the transaction, in addition to drawing a liberal salary, should not cause any degree of surprise, for modesty i 3 certainly not, and never was, included amongst Sir Julius Vogel's virtues. His sole aim seems to be to obtain as mucli as possible from the Colony that he and his party have brought to the verge of ruin. What are the great services that Sir. J, Vogel performed for the Colony ? He certainly initiated the public works policy, and at once obtained credit for the possession of wonderful creative powers; but brilliant as the public works policy was in conception, it was rendered very much the reverse of a blessing by Sir Julius himself; He it was who taught the Colony the habits of extravrgance that have led us into our present financial difficulties; he it was who caused borrowed capital to flow with ruinous freedom from the Treasury. He taught our politicians to talk of millions as glibly as sensible men would speak of pounds. He wa3 the undoubted initiator of the system of purchasing support that resulted in the construction of useless and unremunerative lines of railway. He was unquestionably the parent of the bribery and corruption that has characterised the career of representative government during the past ten years. To him are we indebted for our load of debt, and for the heavy load of taxation that is being heaped upon us. And yet he now talks to us of the great services rendered, and ask 3 us to recompense him richly for services for which he has already been well paid. We have no desire to say anything in disparagement of his great conceptive faculties, but this we do say, that the public works scheme has not proved an unmixed blessing. Had the carrying out of that scheme been placed in the hands of less spendthrifty politicians, had Sir William Stafford, for instance, been entrusted with carrying out the policy which Sir Juliu3 Vogel brought into existence, then we might have had occasion to bless the memory of Sir Julius Vogel and to fittingly recognise the services he had rendered the Colony. As it is, however, the after results militate greatly against the pleasure we might derive when speaking of the works of Sir Julius Vogel. The resignation of Sir Julius Vogel opens up the way to retrenchment in the AgentGeneral's department, and we trust that in making a selection of a successor to Sir Julius Vogel the Government will be guided by a desire to select a man who will willingly assist in cutting down the expenses of an almost useless department of the public service.