A BUSINESS MINISTER

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 29, 26 September 1931, Page 2

A BUSINESS MINISTER

The appointment of the Hon. Robert Masters, as Minister for Tourist and Health resorts is one of considerable importance to Rotorua as the Minister in charge of that Department can do a great deal to assist or retard the progress of this centre. Mr. Masters, although not a member of the elected chamber, is a business man of wride experience and proved ability while during the last year, he has been recognised by those in touch with political events, as one of the powers behind the United Party. Eefore the coalition became an accomplished fact Mr. Masters was responsible for a great deal of preliminary organisation worlc •on behalf of the party, and it is recognised that he has been closely concerned in the inner councils and deliberations of the late Government. He was assisted in this work by the fact that he was at that time a member of the executive council without portfolio, but he has already given evidence of energy and ability which fit him for a rank which is too often entirely undistinguished by these attributes. As a business man, Mr. Masters will be able to appreciate the importance of the tourist traffic and the methods which should be used to encourage it to the fullest extent. The portfolio of Tourist and Health resorts is one which requires in a peculiar degree, the faculties of keen business insight, tempered with vision and imagination. Because the returns from the tourist traffic cannot be listed to clecimals of pence and lodgecl with the Treasury in triplicate, there has in the past been too great an inclination on the part of Ministers to introduce cheese-paring and short-sighted methods in their administration of the Department, in order that small economies

raay justity their lack of mtelligent foresight. It is to be hoped that Mr. Masters will not fall into the errors which have characterised the admmistration of some of his predecessors, but will take up the work of development where the late Sir Joseph Ward laid it down. ^ Whatever crit'icisms may be Ievelled against the late Prime Minister in his admmistration, he cannot by any stretch of imagination, be accused of a lack of vision in the methods which he adoptecl to develop the attractions of Rotorua and other ^ tourist resorts. It cannot be disputed that had the policy which the late Sir Joseph Ward laid down, been adhered to by his successors in office, the tourist traffic of this country would to-day be in a much more healthy condition than it is at present. A penny wise and pound foolish policy has too often in the past restrieted the normal growth of New Zealand's tourist traffic, and past holders of the portfolio have been too slow to realise the opportunities they liave passed by through lack of a proper appreciation of the possibilities of that traffic. Other countries, with much less value to oifer the tourist than has New Zealand, have obtained vastly greater results because they

nave oeen progressive enough to realise that a tourists traffic justffies a reasonable outlay to foster its encouragement. Mr. Masters has a wonderful opporfcunity before him to prove that New Zealand's tourist traffic can be used as one of the chief means to restore the fortunes of the country. It is one of the greatest potentialities which this Dominion possesses and Mr. Masters can play a great part in the rehabilitation of New Zealand by recognising it as such.