The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo. MONDAY, APRIL 29, 1889.

Auckland Star, Volume XX, Issue 100, 29 April 1889, Page 4

The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo.

MONDAY, APRIL 29, 1889.

a> . Tor the oauso that Uci._ aauistc-ice, For the wrong that ncorts resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that we can do.

One of the first questions that will have to be answered by the Government on the assembling of Parliament, will re. late to their promises of support to the Dunedin Exhibition. A cloud of mystery envelopes this matter that is by no means re-assuring, and we believe that an unreserved disclosure of the facts will show that the provincial proclivities of what is virtually an Otago Ministry have in this instance caused them to commit the colony to liabilities that were altogether unwarranted. In speaking of this subject we are not animated in the smallest degree by antagonism to the Exhibition. On the contrary, our columns in the past will prove that we have throughout wished it the fullest measure of success. In the beginning, however, the promoters of this Exhibition disclaimed any thought of calling upon the Government for assistance. It was to be a purely Dunedin enterprise, sustained by Dunedin capital and worked out by Dunedin brains. The world was to be shown how an exhibition could be worked without any loss at all—or, as the Captain of H.M.S. Pinafore might say, " hardly " any. Next we heard that the Government had agreed to give a •- weeny teeney little bit" of help, in order to secure a valuable addition to the original scheme. They were not to make any grant but to undertake one portion of the building; the whole of their share, it was declared, would not commit them to a liability of more than ,£5,000. Well, this-was a departure from the original conditions. Still, no very great opposition was offered. For our own part, we felt that if the affair was to cost the colony no more than then we should get out ot it fairly well. But the end was not yet. Time went on. there were visits of Commissioners to Wellington and of Ministers to Dunedin, at which, we presume, the number of Otago noses in the House was carefully counted, and at length a Press Association telegram went through the length and breadth of the land announcing that the Government had agreed to settle all claims on account of the Dunedin Exhibition by guaranteeing a lump sum of ,£IO,OOO. When we remember that up to this moment the propriety of holding an Exhibition has never been before Parliament, that not one sixpence has been voted for the purpose by the House of Representatives, it must be confessed that the Ministry have j taken a somewhat daring flight, and I are probably placing rather too much faith upon the number and Romanesque proportions of those Otago noses in promising a sum of £10,000 as a subsidy for an enterprise which has been undertaken, and is being carried out, simply by a private company of Dunedin residents. If the credit of the colony can safely be pledged by any Cabinet to such an extent without reference to Parliament, the House of Representatives may as well abandon its control over the public purse altogether. But it seems that the £10,000 is by no means to see the Colonial Exchequer quit of this costly business, although when that price was paid for the Wellington Exhibition, sanctioned by .'Parliament and carried out under ■official control, a considerable outcry urose. The Dunedin correspondent of j i:he " Insurance and Banking Record," pwho is evidently well informed, "lets kthe cat put of the bag." He says :—

"The Ministry have pledged themselves to give a sum of p£io,oooa towards the building,, and have undertak*. other liabilities which will lead them into an expense of another £- 000." So that the is only to the Governmen. contribution towards the Exhibition building, and Ui"V have committed themselves to other liabilities which will certainly cost more, and may, for aught we k'-"--w, cost two or three times that an. >unt.

Taken altogether, this is a very pretty business, and will stand a good deal of ventilation. It is almost needless to inquire at the present ?\ i,..'. whether an ; expenditure of tion the public | treasury was or was not warranted by the circumstances of the colony for this ( purpose. While giving the people of Dunedin all credit for the enterprise shown in their original determination to carry out an Exhibition at their own cost, or with some slight aid from the Government, we believe that the expenditure of ;£r 5,000 taken out of the public taxes would not under any circumstances have been justifiable, and will never be recouped by any tangible results accruing from the Exhibition. The best informed authorities declare that the mammoth show held at Melbourne last year did not draw any appreciable number of vigors from Europe —certainly not- one thousand Recording to the most: liberal calculations. Exhibitions are too common in ali European countries and are carried out on too magnificent a scale for the mere announcement, of such a show in these colonies to draw people across the world. Nor can we expect that the exhibition in Dunedin will even attract Australian visitor., who have just been surfeited with the great show in the Victorian capital. An exhibition of the industrial products of New Zealand and the South Sea Islands, organised on a good scale and well - managed, would have cost very little, and would have answered all the requirements of New Zealand at this time. We believe that was the original intention of the projectors of the Dunedin Exhibition, and it wasa schemethat commandedoin heartiest sympathy and support. But, like all such projects when extravagance is fostered by a pliant Ministry, the original lines on which the Dunedin Exhibition was projected have become obliterated, and this large sum, wrung from the taxpayers of the colony, is being handed over for expenditure by a board who are practically irresponsible to the Government of the colony by whom the money is to be furnished. The precedent is a notable one, and will here'-lter become conspicuous in the history of parliamentary government in New Zealand. We can hardly believe it credible, however, that provincial prejudices will blind the eyes of even the Otago members to the dangerous defiance of parliamentary control that _is involved in such a proceeding. If it were deemed advisable by the Cabinet to expend from the public revenue on a Jubilee Exhibition, the whole question of site and management should undoubtedly have been discussed and settled by Parliament. The questioninighthave been brought before the House before its rising last year; but failing that, an early session this year would still have afforded time for its consideration. As the case stands now, a few private persons in Dunedin have been permitted to drag the country into heavy liabilities without parliamentary authorisation, and through the weakness and incompetence of the Ministry have virtually taken into their own hands the functions of the Legislature.