THE PUBLIC SERVICE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 107, 21 September 1912, Page 4

THE PUBLIC SERVICE.

STRONG CRITICISM.

By Telegraph—Own Correspondent. Wellington, Last Night. In a remarkably outspoken article e» the Public -Service this evening the Post makes -the following pungent remarks: —"The Opposition goes steadily from bad to worse. The Public Service Bill provided its supporters with an excellent, opportunity for dealing .with a great national question on'non-party lines.. After the introduction of the Bill had been followed by the report of the Public Service Commission, a Commission appointed by the Mackenzie Government, which 'concurred in all essential pointa with the policy of the Bill, this attitudeshould have been a comparatively easy one for the. party to adopt. It would have been particularly easy on the second reading of the Bill, when it ie principles ami not details that are the chief concern. Not merely was the chance missed, but the best possible use was made of the occasion to add to the load of discredit under which the party already laboured. The. Bill was attacked with a violence of invective that was evtti move ludicrous than it was disgusting. If the Government had been a hand of political robbers, invading the sacred precincts of honesty and efficiency, there, would 'have been some foundation for this lurid rhetoric, but, as everybody knows, the case is exactly the opposite. The Government's Public Service Bill seeks to exclude the political robber, whether of their own colour or of any other, from the public offices, and as the measure will operate in the first, instance to reduce their own opportunities for maladministration, Ministers should at least be credited by an 'honourable opponent with motives that are above suspicion. Any such magnanimity as this has, however, been entirely absent from the Opposition's criticism. A measure which should have been kept on a plane far above party bickering wa« assailed on the second reading with all tho abuse that the party could command, and. the perversity which thus makes the Opposition a spirited and united party for tlie lir-t time this session was carried still further when the Bill was in Committee. Yesterday the rhetoric was perhaps less lurid, but the antagonism to the Bill was just as bitter, ami there was the same utter lack of statesmanship on the main line of attack.