The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE THURSDAY, JULY 3, 1919. COLLAPSE OF THE STATE RAILWAY MANAGEMENT.

Taihape Daily Times, 3 July 1919, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

THURSDAY, JULY 3, 1919. COLLAPSE OF THE STATE RAILWAY MANAGEMENT.

With which its incorporated ‘ “The Taihape Post and Waimarino News.”

It is the arrival of the evil day that will assuredly discover any provision made there ancnt, our incapacity to guard :IgalllSt_. or our culpable improvidence therefore. That day has overtaken our Railway Department, a Department, for which the Reform regime, recognising its natural weaknesses, imported a manager who had reached a high position 011 the privately-owned profiteering monopoly of railways in England. A man who proved himself to know little else than how to bleed the people of this Dominion, who had occasion to use the railways, a martinet who cared little for the comfort, or even the moral rights of railway servants, a man who permitted nothing to stand in the way of his ‘squeezing the public. His rel'gii'"ovcr the railway service ended ignoinini‘ously; the people of the country had ‘made it plain they Would give him ‘his return ticket to England just so ‘soon as they could express their views at a general election. This railway muddle Was‘ the creation of the only Reform Government this Dominion is ever likely to be cursed withhand [before being deprived of their ill‘used supreme powers of government lthe Reforniers have sent their im‘ported profiteer and martinet back to whence they unearthed him. We have ‘had frequent occasion to show from ‘time to time how government departments, during the Reform reign ‘have failed to administer the coun‘ti*y’s affairs with any approach to the business ability displayed by private ‘firms who have not devoted their energies to quadrupling their ordin‘ary profits on what commoditie/s or concerns they govern, but, as an outstanding failure the Railway Department, with its Minister and his imported Commissioner, is easily the gi'ea't‘eSt, and it has, at last. all but collapsed. With all the GoVernllient’S I boasted prosperity the railway .system, something for genuine . pride liii pre-Reform days, has failed the ‘people who brought it into existence, ‘only because coal boats were held" up for‘ one week by bad weather at‘ ‘West Coast coal ports. we discover the Department now" atits lowest ebb; enquiries on rolling-stock have icauscd public uneasiness; coal-owners [have complained of a shortage of ‘trucks to carry coal to homes where gin common humanity it was urgently ‘needed; the service runnings have ‘gone from bad to worse until it has Il‘-0t 01113’ fallen to pieces but it has ‘dragged another public. service down iwith it_ The Postal Department has ‘had to dishonour its compacts with the ‘people because the railways have ‘failed, and so we have transit and ‘postal communication. crippled, dis‘iileni'b.el'ed, and exliibiting signs of T“'9l“av'flll'o (ICC3Iv’- The Department llias disclosed its utter incapacity to ‘deal with the large body of railway ‘servants it took over from the admin‘istration that preceded it. Its Ollly idea of progress Seems to be in iexacting as much as possible from the public and conceding as little as ‘possible to its men, which is undoubtedly the very shortest out to 'illdusti'ia.l_ trouble and unrest’ for ‘there is no section of the man service ‘satisfied’ with present conditions into lwhich their martinet manager, now ‘ . 3 administration has now been ‘disclosed as a monument to Reform mismanagement. The Minister of ‘Railways 01113’ uses the broad, but an“o}’i".«‘.3l§" i'ndefinit.c statenieirt that ‘there is no coal worth mentioning in Sight: but When pressed, he added that the Shmllage was owing to boats being held up by bad weather at Grcymouth for a week, and men at the .Stato' Mine were idle for a few hours. A week of bad weather stood between the business, industrial and domestic needs of this Dominion and the breakdown of its railway system; is it credible? If British Railway Magnates want to point to an object lesson against nationalisation of railways they will without doubt “star” the New Zealand Government railWay ihreakdown; in fact we may expect to soon" have the information cabled out to us that they have lost no time in doing so. The people‘ are

at the mercy Of their self-impose<l Government, but their will no doubt take peaceful means of effecting a change at the earliest pussible mement, if nothing more drastic happensin the meantime.