MINISTERIAL DOINGS.

Waikato Argus, Volume V, Issue 357, 22 October 1898, Page 1 (Supplement)

MINISTERIAL DOINGS.

The following appeared lately in the Otago Daily Times : The one distinctive element by which above all others the present Ministry will be remembered when its term of ollice closes will be the extraordinary degree of personal " extras " which its members have in one way or another secured from their public position directly or indirectly during the period of their control, aud the extraordinary devices which have been resorted to in order from time to time to veil the facts from the public eye. We are reminded of this by the disagreeable discovery just made that the £1750 paid to the Premier in excess of and addition to salary for five months' traveling expenses (it will be remembered that all his expenses in England were in addition paid by the British Government, anil that his salary went on all the same) does not, after all, cover the outlay upon his trip. Other items, clearly understood to have been payable out of the £l7so—which itself was nearly double the sum asked for expenses by any other Premier —have been discovered dotted almost invisibly into this and that corner of the Estimates, to be paid by the public, instead of by the Premier out of the liberal sum handed hnn for the payment of his Jubilee expenses. This, disagreeable as it is, and uncomfortable as must; be the thoughts suggested by the discovery as to other possible cases of a similar kind, is only in accordance with the peculiar history of this Government, the members of which have from the first evinced a most remarkable faculty for extracting the utmost legal advantage out of the opportunities afforded by office. Personal dishonesty in connection with the public funds has, no doubt, been entirely avoided, but political cunning, which is well enough in its way on certain occasions, is at gravely misplaced when it is directed towards silently and surreptitiously inereisiug the emoluments and rewards of office, or even, as in the present instance, towards such devious though not actually dishonest manipulations of special funds as must cause astonishment aud uneasiness among the Premier's staunchest friends. From first to last this peculiar characteristic has beeu prominent in the " Liberalism " of the Seddon Ministry ; and it is certainly hardly the less disturbing for being on the riyht side of actual personal corruption. A few of the most notable cases selected out of many may be here set down as instancing what everyone must have noticed, and what few, we imagine, can have failed to at least inwardly deprecate and condemn. Perhaps the first instance was the salary to Mr Ward (£4000) which was wriggled through the Estimates in the last" hours of the session several years ago, thus by a surprise vote defeating the law which set a limit to the number of paid Ministers. The capture of Mr Ward by the offer of a seat in the Cabinet was fair political play, and rather to be admired as a clever and effective move on the part of the new Ministers ; aud since Mr Ward turned out to be a very good PostmasterGeneral aud well worth, in that capacity the salary asked, there would have been a good chance of success had an alteration in the law been boldly and openly requested at the time. But in order to secure the money without running any risk, the Ministers must needs stoop to the trick here noted, which, however, was a good deal less reprehensible than some cf the similar acts which impunity has since impelled them to commit iu the pursuit of similar advantages. Mr Cadman's case we do uot desire to make too much of; he was, at least, exceedingly indiscreet in mixing up his dealings" with native lands and his official duties as Native Minister, and the fact that his resignation after the crushing verdict of the Napier jury was followed by his replacement in the Cabinet in a different capacity was not absolutely satisfactory to his many friends on both sides of the House. Mr Reeves' visit to Australia " to inquire into " something of no great interest to anybody, just as a member of his family was due there on the homeward voyage, was a more typical instance of these peculiarities. Subsequently, both Mr Beeves and Sir Patrick Buckley secured for themselves Cabinet eppointments of a preferable kind. About the same time two other Ministers—the Premier and Mr McKenzie—entered the salaried service of a certain syndicate aud a certain company who wanted them for purposes as to which no doubt has ever been entertained, while Mr Ward was busy in similar directions which are now notorious. The legitimacy of the two former appointments was challenged in Parliament, and the two Ministers implicated, by means of a frantic whipping up of their supporters aud by voting in their own iuterests themselves on the division, just managed to save their deserved censure—and their " extra " billets—by one of the narrowest majorities ever recorded during their term ot office. The incident was felt to be a thorough scaudal, aud so it still remains. Mr Ward, meanwhile, had taken a trip to England and arranged certain private matters there which afterwards became most unpleasautly famous —the country, of course, aa usual paying for the excursion. On returning Mr Ward once more came to the front as the propounder of startling bank legislation which had a profound bearing on his private affairs, and the subsequent developments were too unpleasant to be now dwelt upon ; suffice it to say that in some icspects these transactions were the least respectable chapter in the political history of the colony so far. In continuation of this same banking legislation, the. Premier, seeing another of his favourite opportunities, created a certain paid office and appointed himself to fill it ; and while drawing that salary and his hire from the Anglo-German syndicate, aud his pay as Premier, and his liberal expenses from the English Government, and a special Jubike allowance of £BO a week besides, he was, it now appears, still occupied in devising meaus for getting certain further items diffused with beautiful iudefiuiteness over the departmental estimates. All this time the Ministers, especially the Premier and Minister fcr Lands, have beeu drawing such extreme " expenses " and " allowances " of the eommoncr kind that the leg:d total of such things has annually been largely exceeded, ind this is still going on, returns being held b.ick by every available device from the representatives of the people ; while one Minister's family has benefited by the startingly easy terms upon which another Minister, self-appoiute4 to administer certain quasi-public lands, has been good enough to transfer them by private contract" to his colleague. These are only a few instauces stated with the utmost moderation. We hope they are a unique record in English countries, at any rate.