WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 219, 30 December 1916, Page 4

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

RUMOURED CABINET CHANGES. (Special Correspondent). WELLINGTON, Dec. 29. The statement apearing in one of the Napier newspapers to th e effect that on the return of Mr Massey and Sir Joseph Ward to the Dominion two other members of the Cabinet will resign their portfolios is merely a belated echo of a story that has been floating about Wellington for some months past without obtaining any more credence than is given to the rumour that the Minister of Finance is to take the High Cbmmisionership and Sir Thomas Mackenzie to come back to New Zealand to resuscitate the fortunes ,of the Liberal party. Th e names of the two Ministers who are credited with being eager to free themselves from irksome responsibilities are freely mentioned, and the cause of their discontent is openly discussed. . They are dissatisfied, it seems, with the unprogressiveness of the National Government and with the administration of the Military Service Act and the War Regulations, and are determined to emphasise the protests they have made in the Cabinet room in the only constitutional way that lies open to them. This, of course, is their friends' version of the story. There is another version which does not represent them as taking the initiative in the matter, but there is no need to repeat it here. MINISTERIAL DIFFERENCES.

That there have been some differences of opinion expressed in Cabinet dur ing the absence of the party leaders, everybody knows. But differences of opinion ar,e inevitable among strong men, and do not necessarily mean dissensions. There would be no advantage in the multitude of counsellors, commended to us on high authority, if the counsellors were always unanimous. It is possible, however, that the revival of the rumour that Sir Thomas Mackenzie is returning to New Zealand with the intention of re-entering public life here may have given the differences of opinion between Ministers more significance than they would have borne in other circumstances. It is alleged that two of .Sir Thomas' colleagues in the short-lived Cabinet of 1912 arc not particularly comfortable in the National Cabinet, and would look more favour upon the return of their old chief to office than upon the indefinite continuance of the present arrangement. But it must not be assumed on this account that they would throw away lightly the substance of an assured position for the elusive shadow of being included in a new combination. It is human nature to hold on to the certainty of the present, rather than to dare the chances of the future. TRUSTING TO PROVIDENCE

Tlic Military Service Boards are serving several useful purposes apart from determining the claims of reluctant and embarrassed Reservists to be excused from a place in the firing line. One of these was brought into strong relief by the Wellington Board this -week, when the general manager of railways applied for the exemption of an employee of his Department, an expert time-table and train-running clerk, on the ground that he wag performing an essential service and his enlistment would be contrary to public interests. The district traffic manager stated in his evidence that there were three men employed in this particular work, that they had no understudies, and if one of them fell ill or was enlisted "the transport work would be seriously delayed." If two of the men were taken away "some portion of the work would have to stop.'' The man on whose account the appeal was made said he had no definite hours of work, but was averaging eleven hours a day at present, and every third week had to be at call day and night. These revelations have provoked much comment here, and people are wondering how much of the public interests are dependent upon the loyalty, health and lives of individuals. HAPHAZARD MANAGEMENT.

The remedy sugested by the Board for thi s obviously undesirable state of affairs ig that some officer should be trained as an understudy to the timetable and train-running expert,, and that during the war a number of trains "run for the purpose of conveying the public to race meetings, shows and other excursions" should be reduced. Local business people, who claim to have a layman 's knowledge of railway management, while in no way averse to reducing the number of excursion trains, maintain that this is not the economic-way of dealing with the problem. The experts should be trained, of course, a dozen of them rather than that a man should be engaged on such responsible work for eleven hours a day. and they should be enlisted for. home; service, as should every other State employee, but the time has not yet arrived for cutting down the railway facilities and the railway revenue in order to release two hundred or three hundred men for the filing "line. It would be a patch-work way of going about the business, and would give much less satisfactory results jthan would the system?tie. organisation of the whole civil population. This view, though stated quite seriously, is probably impracticable without further legislation, but it is shared by many <?ane people who have reconciled themselveg to the idea of compulsion-; ■ ~ '