The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 1917 THE PUBLIC TRUST OFFICE.

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 220, 29 September 1917, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 1917 THE PUBLIC TRUST OFFICE.

(With which is incorporated The Tai* hapo Post and Waimarino News).

If the success of an institution indicates its usefulness and proves the need for its existence, then there is no public institution in New Zealand that has so thoroughly vindicated its claim to our appreciation and patronage as the Public Trust Office; and yet, perhaps, no State venture has so deeply, cut into private enterprise, so effectually diverted business from oldtime and legitimate channels as it has. Mankind, as we come in contact with it, is prone to treat with levity any question in which lawyers and money come together, but we can safely venture to state that no section of the community has ever accepted with more patriotism this opposition to their interests than lawyers have the institution and extensions of the Public Trust Office. As showing how solicitors view this competition we need only mention Mr. Wilford’s remarks (in the House when legislation changing the management of the Public Trust Office was under discussion. He said "the Public Trust Office is the graveyard of lawyers,” but that should not prevent him from endeavouring to make it as efficient and as useful an institution as possible. The Public Trustee, is by the new legislation, which has just passed the Upper House, practically abolished and a Board of three Trustees replaces him; but virtually there is but one Trustee as before. We do not like to suggest that the new Trustee that replaces Mr. Pitchett is a political appointment, but it seems that the Government were to some extent morally bound to find a position for Mr. Triggs. As Public Service Commissioner, we do not know whether Mr. Triggs has been a success, but we naturally conclude that the office of the Public Service Commission has been a failure, because its chief is removed to be the chief of the Public Trust Office and no appointment is to fill the position he vacates. In reading criticisms in both Houses of Parliament it is difficult indeed to sift out evidence that preponderates favourably or unfavourably on the new appointments, we are therefore justified in presuming that the Government with all inside information at its back, has done the correct and desirable

thing. There will be some public regret that an old, experienced capable officer, as Mr Ronaldson undoubtedly, is, should be passed over, and it is this semblance of political appointments that has filled our public service with dissatisfaction and discontent. Mr, Triggs has no experience of either the business or of the law: he must depend upon the advice of Mr. Ronaldson in one, and on that of Mr. Macdonald in the other. Explanations for the course taken given in the House are by no means __ convincing and we think both Members of Parliament and the general public should jealously guard the rights of those men who have given their lives to the service of their departments, by seeing that the natural and just course of preferment is not unfairly interfered with. The Public Service Commission is an admitted mistake and it is being lopped off, and we have no doubt whatever that our Government will find that other ap- j pointments that were to relieve party j Government from the dirty work involved in election promises will sooner or later have to be abolished, but the people should see to it that the whitewashers set free should not be pitchforked over life-time servants to the head and control of other departments where they can be little else than highly paid political dummies. There is just one change in the conduct of Public Trustee Office business that distinctly adds to public convenience and gives much more efficient control. The agency,, which we have good reason to know, is neither fish, flesh, or fowl, is to be abandoned and a fully fledged branch is to come into being wherever business warranted the existence of an agent. The Public Trust Office has come to stay and all should work together to make it, not so much a hunter for business on syndicate lines, but an efficient moans of handling a class ot work that no other institution either public or private is just so perfectly adapted for. That the Public Trust has proved a public benefaction lies in the fact that Britain has copied New Zealands lead and has now an institution that has made more wonderful progress than the most sanguine could have anticipated. It is only about, twelve years ago that the English Public Trustee came into existence and he to-day controls many millions of pounds worth of the people's business. Whether the Triune Trifst will add to the usefulness and smooth running of the fast growing business of the office, or become more amenable to political interference experience can only divulge, but if there is, one State enterprise that should be absolutely free from all taint of politics it is that which is now under the control of a Board, under a triune head instead of the single mind as hitherto. It is an experiment the success of which time only can prove. CLASS LAWMAKING. We, with a very large proportion of the people of this country were alarmed at what appeared to bo a seditious break-out in our Parliafncnt, but then Members of Parliament, like kings, can do no wrong, and what would be sedition outside the House, is quite the proper thing inside. Inside the House words may be uttered with indifference that would cosft. many hundreds or thousands of pounds in damages and law costs if said outside. So it is that Mr. Herdman’s attempt at justification for rebellion is just so much dish-water. Yet, let it be bruited abroad, Mr. Herdman made some very pertinent remarks. Whether he intended it or not, he made it very clear that he considered' that Six O’Cloejc Closing was a law that would operate one way for the rich and another for the poor. He pointed out that if it was going to cut out the, bottle of wine at dinner, it would not be passed, but the bottle of wine man was quite ready to sacrifice his brofher who could not afford the wine. He was right there to make all the men who are called into camp prohibitionists against their will, and to deny to them the privileges of the laws of the land which he fully enjoyed. In watching the Six O’Clock measure we sec a desire to extend the rich man’s exemption from the drastic provision of the Measure, so that when he is travelling he can he lawfully supplied with his wine in the hotels he may patronise, Now, Tie cannot very well, in common decency, be so exempted from the law’s prohibitions without similar exemption being given to men who practically live on the road and to all others who find it necessary to travel. So it is we find that legislators arc engaged in the process of giving the Six O ’Clock Closing Bill that form that will permit ail these nice little exemptions, and so legalise the rich man’s wine, and still keep the poor man’s beer a crime to touch. From lobby talk and from the statements of many men who supported the Bill in the House, it is very apparent that, if the Upper House will amend the measure in the direction stated, they will support it. Our readers will know that the Drink Question as generally understood does not enter into our contentious, but they have now evidence, indisputable, of what we did, and do, contend for, and that is that while a law is on the

Statute Book every man shall be on i an absolutely just equality before and ' 'under that law. "We now have Parliament cutting a sorry figure in making a class enactment more classy, in exempting men who are travelling from i its provisions. Here is the crux of the j question, will the exemptions be ex- I tended to soldiers in camp so that they may enjoy privileges somewhat . equal to what the bottle of wine men are likely to be given? Not at all, the whole thing was another callous sacrificing of a brother's blood. What do we care about whose liberties are curtailed and limited so that our bottle of wine is there when we want it no matter where we are?'ln an insane de- J sire to put compulsion on soldiers, they did not care who suffered so long as their bottle of wine was safe. We are not unreasonable, and if the Government, or the men who are willing to vote the bottle of wine to the rich or the glass of beer to the poorer trav- | cller, will extend the privilege to those J ■who cannot afford or do not care to . keep liquor in their houses, and also [ , to the men who must remain in camp till after Six O'Clock, the Bill shall "nave our heartiest support, but we will be no party to a law that permits the bottle of wine and glass of beer to one and makes prohibitionists of sol- I diers and the huge majority of the country's taxpayers. We are most determinedly opposed to legislation that is so obviously of a class nature. Under our laws there should be equality of privilege, whether it be wharf-labourer or merchant, seamen or shipowner, road-labourer, or millionaire, the law must operate uniformly on all, and the man that does not stand for that equality has, without doubt, a moral kink.