COLONIAL GOVERNORS.

Te Aroha News, Volume I, Issue 49, 10 May 1884, Page 6

COLONIAL GOVERNORS.

Colonial Governors have, as a rulo, led easy and pleasant lives. Their salaries are extravagantly largo comparod with the incomes of the principal colonial officers and the highest officials in the English public service, and they have nothing to do but make thomselves agreenblo and avoid partizanship. But theso small duties seem to be too much for some of the appointees of tho Colonial Office. The Victorian press has lately been making some rather plain comments on the administration of the Marquis of Normanby. The "Age" says : — " If the question could be put in such a way as to demand an unequivocally truthful answer, there cannot be a doubt that Sir Charles Darling, pitilessly slandered while he stayed here, and quitting office in disgrace, occupied a much higher position in the minds of all thoughtful men than Lord Normanby occupies, though ho has enjoyed quiet times, and carries away a parchment record of insincere compliment. . . . Can anyone, even of those who have signed one or other claptrap address to Lord Normanby, regard him as a man who has? in any way contributed to keep a high ideal before the eyes of tho community ? Does anyone associate him -with the initiation of any good or useful movement ? Has he ever uttered a generous sentiment ? lias ho tried to mitigate the rancour of party warfare ? lias he ever sacrificed comfort or pleasure to the discharge of oflicial duties ? lias he surrounded himself with good men, or even with the most respectable and distinguished members of the party to which lie has attached himself? Those who praise him cannot mi rely praise him without evident insincaity for any one of these qualities. What they can say is that helms lived no : selessly out of the world ; that his private life has been perfectly decorous ; that lie found himself thoroughly at home with the members of the O'Loghlen Ministry ; that he has kept out of flagrant political scrapes : and that if no one can say much good of him neither can any one say much harm. Ho has been, in fact, one of those men whom Dante described, a\lio lived without infamy and without distinction. As the mayor of a city ho would have been a success, as (Governor of a great colony he leaves the impression of being rather an ignoble representative of English royalty." But n more serious charge still is made again&t the late Governor and his predecessor. They were paid a princely income, and aie accused of perpetrating petty meannesses. This, if true, is unpardonable. In the case specified by the "Age," Sir George Bowen was the first and chief offender. The parsimonies of that apostle of gush are not unknown to New Zealanders. The squabbles ovor the payment for his archery materials and cradle are part of the public records. The £10,000 salary of our sister colony was not productive of more liberal sentiments. The manu'uvre by which Sir George Bowen is said to have shifted from his private purse on to tho Colonial Treasury the payments of a salary properly belonging to his Private Secretary's office ib more ingenious than creditable. It appears that His Excellency applied for and obtained the assistance of one of the clerks in the Chief Secretary's oilice to assist his Private Secretary, undertaking to pay £200 a year towards his salary. The arrangement lasted for two years, but in 1878, by an order in Council, this gentleman was appointed a clerk in the Executive Council oflice to continue to assist in the oiHco of his Excellency the Governor in business connected w ith the Executive. His salary of £250 was ordered to be paid from the appropriation for "Clerk and expenses of the Executive Council, and to date from Ist July, 1878." Mr Berry's second Ministry was responsible for this gross irregularity, which meant simply, as the " Age " lucidly explains, that ""the Ministry took £230 out of tho sum appropriated by schedule for the clerk and e.xpen&es of the Executive Council, and devoted it to paying a gentleman who is not in the employ of the Executive Council, or under the control of Mr Wadsworth, but who is in the employ and under the control of the Governor." Our Victorian contemporary is not, by any means, gentle in its denunciation of the transaction. It observes : "Of course, we cannot use tho term malversation of funds in connection with an ex-Governor and ev-Ministers ; but an arrangement in a merchant's oflice by which the head clerk's groom should be paid vv ith a portion of the fund intended for ofHce expenses would, w e think, be viewed unfavourably by the law. Unquestionably the chief blame in this transaction rests m itli Hir George Bowen and the second Berry Ministry, who deliberately entered into a compact to evade the law, and who ante-dated their illegal appointment that Sir George might save a half-year's salary. As for Lord Normanby 's share in tho matter, we may be permitted to hope that he never had the .state of the case brought before him. It is easy to understand that a man accustomed to large expenditure may not look very carefully into his household expenses, and may forget to inquire whether he has paid the salary of a particular officer of his staff. Of course, if Lord Normanby understood the fraud that has been practised upon tho public, there would be no moral difference between him and Sir George Bowen."

Mr U. B. Morris, M.H.R. for Tauranga, has written to the Auckland Trades and Labour Council in reply to a circular recently issued by that body. Ho says :—: — " Ho lirst resolution that you forward me —single electorate for Auckland city in lieu of four — you do not givo mo your reasons for wishing this. It is not clear that yom Council represents a majority of Auckland citizens, and even if it did that fact should not bo decisive, but •would, no doubt, carry great weight. As at present iuformed, I shall not vote for a single electorate. It appears to me that a block of four might be returned all ot one way of thinking. The people generally, I think, would be better represented by a mixture, which they arc more likely to get from four constituencies than ono. I don't wish to see the House divided into town members and country members. With regard to the second resolution — immigration— you go outside our own province, I think, when you speak of 'present trade depression.' There is a theory that borrowing and immigration should go hand in hand, and it certainly seems to me that when the million for connecting Auckland and Wellington is in course of expenditure, that employment will be plentiful enough, and that nothing is to be feared now except of quite a temporary kind. lam inclined, however, to go a considerable length with you in this resolution, and am decidedly averse to introducing people for whom no profitable employment can be found. I have never been able to work up any emotion at the thought of the .* teeming millions ' that some people seem so anxious to see in New Zealand. I can't help thinking that wo are so generally comfortable because we are thin on the ground."