COST OF LIVING COMMISSION.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 17 December 1913, Page 4

COST OF LIVING COMMISSION.

Art jitem of £24> that appeared on the' Supplementary Estimates as payment to Messrs--. Yeitcli and Robertson, M.'sJL'., for services rendered oil the Cost of Living Commission, has naturally aroused some curiosity. It appears that these two Labour members Were under an agreement with the,: Mackenzie,. Government to draw £2 2s per day, in- addition to. £l Is per day travelling allowance.- ' The present Government w;a-s, of course, honourably bound to meet a liability incurred! by its predecessors. But the arrangement by wliich two members of the House, Who were already drawing £6 per week from the country in honorarium, and who were privileged to travel free on the railways, should receive £3 3s per day for their services, strikes us as the height of extravagance. When all is said and done, we do not supthat the report of the Cost of Living Commission i§ warth the paper it is printed upon, let alone the' three guineas a, day to Labour members. But your good Liberals have the peculiar faculty for doing things in s;tyle—and beggar the expense!