LOCAL GOVERNMENT.

Patea Mail, Volume III, Issue 275, 1 December 1877, Page 2

LOCAL GOVERNMENT.

(CONTINUED.)

A small but skilled permanent staff of officers could be, and would have to be, employed to conduct the great bulk of the executive business, as in no other way could the work be got done at all, and in no other way is it possible to get it done well.

Petty local views, the bane of our present system, would have very much less chance of flourishing than now. Only look at the fate of the Wanganui County Council ; the best men forcedto retire, and the principal business relapsing into a state of chaos—mainly, I think, the result of the absurd multiplication of governing bodies, and the stupid notions they engender. lam very far from thinking that anything approaching perfection can be reached by any system whatever. Political systems are not so very much after all. Too much stress must not be 'laid upon the value of political machinery. Far more depends upon the men who work it. Good work is often got out of bad systems, and bad work out of systems that are theoretically very perfect. All I contend for is, that our present local governing institutions are a disgraceful muddle, and capable of almost indefinite improvement. If men were all very wise and very disinterested, it would matter little about Acts of Parliament, but as those conditions are a long way from being fulfilled, it does matter a good deal. Having two rating bodies in full swing in the_ same County, and no uniform valuation is not creditable to our legislators. By making the local Council important, a political school of great value would be established in every Borough and County, where principles, and general lines of would be discussed instead of wasting time over mere details of work, which from the nature of the case, a representative body is unfit to decide properly. In this respect, and in many other important points, the provincial system was greatly superior to tho one that supplanted it. A modification of provincialism, by cutting away its legislative powers, as proposed by Mr Rolleston and others, would have been far better than the existing system. A political school, in an} 7 good sense, our present institutions are not. I will give yon a fair sample of the mode of conducting business by the Road Boards and County Councils, and I speak from experience. Imagine nine men, most of them travelling 20 miles to and from a place of meeting, spending hours over the discussion of such questions as the following Whether a particular culvert which is supposed to ho rotten should be re-

paired or replaced by a new one? Whether a certain drain should be made to How into this gully or into that ? Whether a certain land owner has sustained damage by a contractor having carted gravel through his property, and if so, what amount? And so on, and so on, for hours together. To cap all, very likely not one of the nine members knows anything about the particular circumstances of the case in hand. Questions such as these just suit the calibre of some people’s minds, but I don’t think our institutions should be brought down to their level.

I have already said that nine tenths of the business connected with roads that now occupies the time of local bodies should never come before them at all, but be settled by an engineer. With regard to the clerical work, exactly the same may be said. A skilled secretary should be employed and bo held responsible that his work is properly done. If a blunderer should happen to bo chosen, send him about ibis business. The work of the Patea i Council is now well done, principally bei cause it has two very efficient servants. Compare the road management in the Wanganui County with Patea, and yon will sec at once the value of a good public servant. I will say here without fear of contradiction, that if the whole of our main line of road from the Waitolara upwards had^ been In charge of our present Foreman of \\ orks, instead of only portion of it, from the commencement of its construction until now, no County rate would have been required for several years to come. But to return to the main points of my argument. The cutting up of our local institutions into little bits absolutely destroys the power of the Road Boards to employ efficient servants and greatly increases the cost of administration throughout the County, as ono staff could with -much advantage do all the work. I am quite sure that there is plenty to do for one Engineer and a Foreman of Works, as every l)it of work done should be under the supervision ; pf competent men. If the double rate docs hot bring people to their senses nothing will.

f What I desire especially to point out, as it lies at the root of my argument, is, that a representative body, by its very nature, cannot do work well, unless the groat bulk of it is done through servants, who must, JErora the nature of the case, be greatly superior to their masters in special knowledge—who can hardly have interests hostile to their masters, and whom their masters, when they have once chosen them, would do well to trust —subject of course to a very careful general control. I do not for a moment suggest that the servants of the public should be its masters, or that any sort of difficulty should be interposed in the way of bringing them sharply and promptly to

account for any neglect of duty or undud assumption of power. Anything like the reign of officialdom would indeed be very much worse than our present bungling. But the very first condition of carrying ort " public affairs in an adequate manner, is the power of choosing good servants, giving them the necessary powers, and seeing that they do not exceed or abuse them. Is it not quite clear that school-masters, for instance, should, almost entirely, be under the control of Inspectors of schools appointed by the Minister of: Education? What is the use of having 9 committee men for each school, without any money to expend too, unless it is to worry teachers and interfere with wiiat they not understand? Would a central local governing body, with three members from each ward, not be far better for the business management of schools, and everything else than our present, and what is to be our future arrangements ? I am well aware that many people are jealous of officials, however much knowledge they may have of their profession. In my opinion they have much more reason to be jealous of ignorance and petty personal views in certain other quarters. In order to disarm criticism, I may state that there is nothing new or strange at all in what I have just read to yon. The concentration of local governing bodies has been strongly advocated in England for some years past by many of her most eminent political writers and statesmen. In certain other important points in this brief sketch* I have closely followed some of the lines laid down in Sir J. F. Stephens’ recent great work on Parliamentary Government. T. MIDDLEMAN