CURRENT TOPICS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 96, 1 August 1910, Page 4

CURRENT TOPICS

JUSTICES OF THE PEACE. It is as necessary to have learned and impartial Justices of the Peace as it is to have learned Judges and Stipendiary Magistrates. The functions undertaken by the unpaid magistracy are necessary, important and occasionally heavy. A man of the highest intelligence, character and standing should be proud of the honor of J.Pship., for being called to sit j in judgment on his fellow man is a duty ; not to be lightly undertaken, and one requiring balance and ability. New Zealand has not always been entirely fortii-1 nate in all the men holding the com- j mission of the peace, and formerly it | was an uncommon event to find a man appointed for anything else but his political convictions, it was not so much a question of his judicial ability and common sense as the color of his political coat, and Justices came to be something of a byword by reason of some of them who w«re unsuited for the responsible office. We believe the methods of appointment have undergone a needed change, and that men are chosen irrespective of their political faith, as long as they are men of standing and intelligence. The method—or at least the recruiting ground for Justices —in Britain differs greatly from that in New Zealand. English Justices are generally men of wealth and high station—retired navy and army officers, county "squires," rich stockbrokers, and so on. And from an answer to a question in the House of Commons that "in future appointments would be unpolitical," it seems certain that the method! formerly pursued in New Zealand has been also the British method. New Zealand's recruiting ground for justices is probably a more satisfactory one than that of the Old .Country, for the majority of our J's.P. are men who are of the people, and know them. Thsy are not a class apart, and if it can be proved that the culture of the British J.P. is of a higher order than of the 'N.Z. unpaid Magistrate, tt can also be proved that the latter has a far better opportunity of knowing his fellow man and of understanding him. It has ibeen suggested that as a man who knows nothing about law or court procedure may be sitting on a bench tomorrow, totally dependent on the Clerk of the Court for his procedure, he should be required to know something of his duties before he undertakes tnem. j.n Sweden the appointment of unpaid magistrates is made six months before the duties are undertaken, and the .appointees not only have to attend Court once la week during, the probationary period, but have to pass a final examination before a paid justice before beginning his serious work. It has been argued that . the "best men refuse to become justices" in New Zealand, but nobody knows who the "best men" are, unless they can be seen on the bench. On the whole, the man who becomes a Justice because he believes it to be an onerous duty, and who is on the bench for no .other motive than to serve his country, is a better J.P. than the, exalted persons who are superior to the position, and who defame the bench. The . infrequent mistakes of J's.P. is the best evidence that much has been done of late to improve the personnel and efficiency of the Bench. Jj ' FEEDING THE FULL.

Cramming the overfed is injudicious and unhealthy. Presenting, RJockfeller with a cheque for a hundred pounds would be a joke, especially if the presentation were made in the presence of the hungry. Last year retrenehmnt reared its head, and (bit a great many Civil Servants. Perhaps they deserved it; we can't say. This year some of the money that was saved on the bitten servants is to be expended on those who need it least—the men in the higher flights of public duty, who control the persons who do the work. Thus the man to whom a rise in t)ie price ,of bread, or butter, or coal, is a serious matter, trnds luinseU in possession of an extra Is 6d .or 2s Od a week, while the person with £l2 or £l4 a week with which to pay his bills is miade happier with another pound or two a week. Ife is presumed that the Civil Servant w'ith £SOO a year does as much for that sum as he will do this coming year for £6OO, and as it is not at all reasonable that the 'highly paid Civil Servant gets paid by results, it would be interesting, to know on what basis increases are made. It cannot be assumed that a bachelor officer, for instance, is betters entitled to a one hundred poimdis rise than a married twohundred! pounds clerk with four children is to a ten pounds one. It is not known, either, on what system the State baaes [its methods of promotion, who is responsible for dragging a ten shillings a | day man out of the ruck, and mounting him in seven years to the giddy height of £SOO or so, or! how anybody's services are assessed. We have never yet known wealthy Civil Servants to refuse large increases on the ground that poor Civil Servants should benefit, and the men "at the top of the tree" will admit that they do not always live so strenuous a working a life as their humblest understrapper,

NATIONAL ANNUITIES IN CANADA. Canada is no longer keeping the door wide open to immigrants not possessed of some small amount of capital, and the reason for the change is not far to seek. "The day of opportunity on the American continent is passing," remarked the Toronto Globe last month. "The free lands will be exhausted in another quar ter of a century. • *tGreat cities here, as ill Europe, must inevitably mean unemployment and suffering." A recognition of the position that is arising has caused the development of a splendid systep of national annuities that is being pressed upon the attention of the Canadian people by Government officers at the present time. If a man aged twenty will pay to the Government 2s Id per week from the age of twenty to the age of sixty he will receive for the remainder of his life an income of £52 a year. If he should die before reaching the age of sixty, tie State will return to his wife or heirs all that he has paid in, with 3 per cent, compound interest. An additional payment of ltfd a week will secure a guarantee that the £52 a year will be paid to him or to his heirs for no less than twenty years. The case of the young man who commences payments at the age of twenty shows tlie system in a particularly favorable light, of course, but the scheme is a generous one in all its phases. The State pays ithe entire cost of management, and money can be paid in at any money-order office. When once paid in it cannot be withdrawn, seized for debt, or used in any other way than for the provision of an annuity or insurance. If payments are not kept up, the money held to the credit of the individual, with compound interest, is returned at the age of fiftyfive, unless it is sufficient in amount to provide an annuity of £lO a year. Canada lias no old age pensions system, but its national annuities scheme seems to be quite as attractive as the one con tained in the Bill prepared by the New Zealand Government for the same purpose, with the additional advantage that it is not limited in its operation to persons earning no more than £2OO a year.