WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, 13 March 1917, Page 7

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

NATIONAL EFFICIENCY. HOW IT IS 'TO BE ACHIEVED. - (Special Correspondent) Wellington, March 0. The Acting 'Prime Minister has returned from his Auckland tour well satisfied with the spirit in which the Government's national efliciency scheme has been received by the people of the northern province. Farmers, business men and even representatives of labor have assured him of their hearty good will and co-operation. The first business of tho Efficiency Board will be to make provision for carrying on tile affairs of farmers called to military service, and this, Sir James Allen says, is already well in hand. Then the Board will undertake the classification of industries into essential and non-essential, and the organisation of labor with a view to its most profitable distribution. It may he necessary to enrol women in certain industries in which members of their sex have not yet heen employed, and here thfc Minister is confident of a ready and enthusiastic response. Sir James thinks that the good. effects of the scheme will be apparent almost at once, and that its ultimate achievement! will be of great national value.

DISCRIMINATE CONSCRIPTION, The publication of tlie Government's scheme for promoting natiohal efficiency is not saving the Ministerp from the iteration of the criticism to which they have been subjected in this respect since the beginning of the war. Mr 11. D. Vavasour, writing from Blenheim to the

"Dominion." protests that the Government, while urging the. farmers to increase their production by every means in their power, is compelling them to reduce it by conscripting a large part of their available, labor. Apparently lie would have, farm workers, excused' ftom military service altogether. The Labor organisations, on the other hand, are urging that the Government is exacting too much from the workers and too littlo from the capitalists, or, they like to put it, conscripting bone and sinew and exempting wealth. Ties Government's object, of course, u -,o get the most it c.-n from both source , and Ministers claim they are working towards this end.

THE prOTTFR SPEECH. j The Minister of Education is finding the activities of this Department sadly hampered by the financial demands of the war, but he is doing his best with the means at his disposal and -with the assistance of his responsible officers ho is laying the foundations of many reforms lie hopes to institute when this mad worljl is again clothed in its right mind. One of the matters to which he is giving considerat'on is the teaching of reading in the primary and secondary schools. In many of ' the primary sehooln this subject is taught in the most perfunctory fashion, and in most of the secondary schools scarcely at, all. The result is that thousands of children are leaving the schools every year knowing little of the pronunciation "of their own language and nothing at all of the uses of enunciation and emphasis. Mr. Ifannan's wish is to correct this tendency by having reading raised to its proper place of importance ::i the syllabus of every school.

THE CLERGY AXD THE WAR. The Minister oi 'Dcfefee is ttilllicing bombarded with resolutions of protest against clergymen and theologies! stiidenta being conscripted lor the war. One of the curious features of the controver-sy-ia thai Sir James Allen is as often accused of extending favors to one particular church as he is of selecting this clmreh for special persecution. As a matter of fact no sort of distinction i? made lietwocn the clergy of tiie different churches. Tliev all fare just the same in the ballot, and those drawn for service all have the optiqn of undertaking noncombataiit work if they prefer this to going into the firing line. It may seem almost a too persona), matter to mention here, .but those churches that are sensitive on the question of military serviee have reason to be thankful that the Minister has a punctilious regard for religious beliefs and for Christian ideals and aspirations.

FAMINE! Tn his lecture in the Town Hall last night, Dr. A. K. Newman, who has just returned from a visit to Europe, where he had opportunities to see the war and its ravages at closer quarters than are vouchsafed to most travellers, struck a somewhat pessimistic note. There was no assurance, ho said, that the war would end this year or next year. 3 f it did not, famine would "be staring half the world in the face, and the demand for food would lie heard in every country. With this possibility before them Dr. JCewman urged the people of New Zealand to "set aside their flowers for a year or two and to grow vegetables in their gardens.'' Probably the prospect is not quite so gloomy as the doctor suggests, font for months past practical farmers all over the country have been predicting that the scarcity of labor will lead to a great reduction in the production of foodstuffs. One or two of them haye spoken of actual famine. The position is not so serious as that, a prominent business man statt-d to-day, but there would be no harm in owners of gardens substituting potatoes and parsnips for roses and geraniums this year.