WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, 12 January 1921, Page 5

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

THE BURDEN OF EMPIRE. THE NEW ZEALAND NAVY. (Special Correspondent.) Wellington, Jan. 10, The announcement of the Prime Minister’s impending visit to Auckland to welcome the officers and men of the warship Chatham has set tongues wagging again over the question of naval defence. This light armoured cruiser, presented to the Dominion by the Imperial Government, is the first instalment of the New Zealand Naval Division. What the Government intends to do in regard to the rest of the scheme laid down by Lord Jellicoe in his report of last year remains to be revealed. Mr. Massey and his colleagues-have admitted frankly that New Zealand ought to bear a fair share of the burden of naval defence in the Pacific. They scarcely could contend, indeed, that this country is entitled to rely for protection on the British Fleet without making an adequate payment for the service. But Ministers evidently are hesitating over committing the country to an expenditure of something like a million a year for the maintenance of cruisers, destroyers and submarines specified by Lord Jellicoe. IMPERIALISM AND FINANCE. The Chatham alone is going to tax the resources of the Minister of Finance to the extent of about £250,000 a year. The people of the Dominion are still paying off’ the cost of the battleship New Zealand by annual instalments, find will not be clear of the liability for some years to come yet; but the ship itself is practically obsolete. Modern warships are so costly and so short-lived that to build them with borrowed money is no longer sound policy. They do not serve the purposes of a decade, much less of a generation, and it is not just to pass on to posterity, with burdens of its own to bear, obligations which long survive the services for which they were assumed. This, no doubt, is the aspect of the question that is particularly exercising Mr. Massey iand his colleagues at the present time. I They have to determine how much of I the burden of Empire the Dominion of to-day should be committed to bear. NEED FOR ECONOMY. How great his difficulties in this direc. tion are may be judged from the letter the Prime Minister has addressed to his colleagues urging the need for economy in the administration of all departments of the Public Sendee, and from its appearance in the newspapers. The publication of such documents is a most unusual proceeding, and in this instance, obviously is intended to emphasise Mr. Massey’s reiterated appeal lor the discontinuance of all unnecessary expenditure. Mr. Massey does not say in so many words th#t some of the departments have been “overrunning the constable,” but it is notorious that during the war, when abnormal expenditure was absolutely necessary, many of them acquired habits of extravagance that have not been altogether abandoned since the flow of borrowed money into the Treasury ceased. Plainly the Minister has awakened to the fiet that drastic action is necessary. APPLYING THE PRUNING KNIFE. Of course this is not the first occasion on which Mr. Massey has spoken quite plainly on the subject. When he was declining a substantial increase to his own salary during the last session of Parliament, he said the time might not be very far distant when he would have to propose an all-round reduction in the pay of members of the Legislature, and of other servants of the State. During the recess he has hinted at an even, wider application of the pruning knife. There is a feeling among the members of the Civil Service that their positions and pay are being very closely scrutinised, and that reorganisation of a very sweeping nature, perhaps involving a reduction of salaries, is in store for them. Successive Governments and a defective system are responsible for gross extravagance in many departments, and now the of finance has come methods and salaries will have to be reviewed. That this will be done with every consideration for the employees may be taken for granted, but the lessening of expenditure is imperative