WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, 15 May 1918, Page 6

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

DEFJJNCJS iIXPfIXDnmE. f riiE cojLiiiseiON'iS REPORT. (Special Correspondent.) Wellington, May 13. With the close of the sittings of tie Defence Expenditure Commission in sight, speculation as to the nature of its report i s rife. Sceptical people, #remem'bering the ways of previous Commissions and previous Governments, are not sanguine of anything very drastic, resulting from tHio lalbors of Sir Robert Anderson and his colleagues. They have seen a braye slhow of resolution before, they | say, and very little performance. But people better acquainted with Sir Robert Anderson's methods and his work in Australia are much more optimistic. They expect the chairman, whose running commentary upon the evidence has been 'both frank and suggestive, to make recommendations) which it will be impossible for the Minister to ignore. Tlfce need for reform in various directions has been shown beyond the shadow of a doubt, and Sir Robert Anderson is not the sort of man to be a party to olbseuring tihe fact. SO PAR, SO GOOD. During the sitting of the Commission on Saturday morning the chairman paid a somewhat dubious compliment to tihe Minister of Defence. There has been a disposition cn tile part of several witnesses to attribute everything that has gone wrong in the administration of the Department to the obtrusion of political influence, and it was in commenting upon the evidence of a witness who° had contradicted a particular allegation of fflris kind thalt Sir Roiberfc Anderson rather overdid his exoneration of the Minister. "We have asked all over the place," he said, "and never once been able to trace a case in which the Minister of Defence has interfered with an appointment." So far a»s it goes, this is admirable. But the most serious criticism directed against Sir James Allen is that he does not interfere with the heads of Departments enough, and that, among other things, he allows them to make utterly unsuitable appointments witli motives less unimpeachable than his own. THE SEDITION CASES. The Ohrifftcbureh sedition cases, in which three men intimately associated with the lialbor movement were sent to gaol for three months for proposing, seconding and swpporU&g' a motion put to a public meeting Iby the Mayor of thtf city, has attracted a great deal of attention here. Indigmvtion meeting's culminated o n Saturday in a deputation waiting upon the Minister of Justice witih a request that the men should be immediately released, and though the Hon. T. M. Wilford preserved a very proper Ministerial dignity in his reply, it Will not be at all surprising if a very substantial part of the men's penalty should be remitted. At the hearing of the charges the Mavor of Christefrarcfb excused himself for having put the motion by saying he had not noticed its ■seditions character, and a member of the deputation emnhasiswl the very obvious point thut if a oihi>f maefetrate could not detect a breach of the War Epilations it was absurd to expect a plain working man to do COST 00? UVING. The Board of Trade does not get all the honor it deserves in Wellington—this, of course, being its own country—and just now it is being severely taken to task for rushing off to Dunedin to inquire into the prices of groceries there when the prices of groceries here are not only materially higher than those in the southern city, but actually higher than those in any of the smaller towns, with the exception of Napier and Gisborne. The prices of groceries in Wellington are, indeed, a positive scandal, many people with practical knowledge declaring they have soared to their pre- j sent height through the machinations of a ring that has proved too strong for the well-intended legisation of the Government. The facts are published every month bv the Government Statistician, who, in this respect, has done excellent wort, but they have made no impression upon the ring, and now, it appears, have made no insistent appeal to the BoaTd of Trade.