TASKS AHEAD

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26624, 21 November 1947, Page 4

TASKS AHEAD

The members of the newly-elected Dunedin City Council, of the Otago Hospital Board, and the Otago Harr, hour Board should take their seats on these representative public bodies with a heavy sense of responsibility. The poll which has put them into office was, fundamentally, a poll which registered the reaction of a substantial majority of the electorate against Socialism. The new members would in most cases—the Mayor of 'Dunedin and certain of , the sitting members on the City Council and other local bodies provide the exceptions—be flattering themselves if they interpreted the votes cast in their favour as a personal vote. Many of them are comparatively unknown to the people who voted for them. Their virtue resides in the public confidence that they are opposed to State regimentation, and particularly that they have as their paramount interest and ambition the promotion of the welfare of the provincial district of Otago. It is no mean brief that has been confided to them; they must recognise that their responsibility in the years ahead is not confined to civic and provincial administration, but represents a test of the capacity of those who believe in the forms of a constitutional democracy to carry out, not .only well, but superlatively, tasks which, in the cloying and pervasive atmosphere of New Zealand Socialism, have become the sport of Governmental and bureaucratic ideological convictions. They will make mistakes. Public confidence will not be too severely shaken if the mistakes are due to sincere belief and not to party dogma. They can, with their varied —and welcome —catholicity of political views, be relied upon to consider the questions they have to resolve upon their merits. Their future work wilf be judged, and judged closely, by their ability to produce progress in the affairs of this community without succumbing to political pressures and prejudices. There are several ways in, which, at the initial meetings of the reconstituted local bodies, the non-Socialist administrators may provide the evidence of their mettle. On the City Council the selection of committee chairmen should present few difficulties. There are sufficient of men experienced in the business of the city to provide the Mayor with a “ team ” which will work in the team spirit. It is desirable that the allocation of duties should be so made that the new members are not subordinated to the veterans; and that City Council representation on other bodies to which it is entitled to appoint members should be wide and expert, if necessary by co-opta-tion. The Harbour Board, with p co-

| vincial responsibilities and representation, must combine sou.id management with far-seeing planning, yet beware of grandiose schemes—a task requiring a nice discernment. . '• It is, perhaps, on the Hospital Board that the new influences maybe most immediately tested in action. There is, here, a fortunate blending of administrative experience with specialised practical knowledge. The new members deserve an important, if not a predominant, role in the work of the board. They require a chairman wife's aggressive and versed in the \ intijjfecies-of: hospital management, JuiiSie v.grdipt of the poll should . choice rather r of precedences as a LalMj§|

representative on the board should not be overlooked. No local public body has more difficult and pressing problems to resolve as rapidly as progress can be made. The completion of works in hand, the reorientation of the panic planning in mass maternity home projects, the re-formation of the poorhouse buildings and atmosphere of the Talboys Home, even the peculiar and selective system of allocation of the use of the baths in the massage department building, require prompt and forthright decision. There is scope in the work ahead for the full use of the time and talents of those who, in a poll which rejects Stateism, have been given the opportunity to prove that civic corporate enterprise is still the best spirit in our community life. They must not fail in the charge with which the public has entrusted them.