Need To "Grease Palms"

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXXVII, Issue 14930, 18 March 1949, Page 4

Need To "Grease Palms"

Presence Of Social Dishonesty

Challenge Of Archbishop Of Canterbury

In the war we gave all we had, said the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Fisher, in a broadcast to the people of Britain. We cannot expect to make ends meet again before 1952. But we have gone a long way towards making them meet, and we have done it by sheer self-denial and hard work. That is a fine thing. With so much to our credit we have an uneasy feeling that there is too much on the debit side. None of us liked that Tribunal the other day. One of the witnesses said that what was quite ordinary in business life was improper and indiscreet in political life. We jealously keep our political life and Civil Service above suspicion. but does this mean that we do not expect business life to be too honest?

May palms be greased there, openly or under a disguise? Is that ordinary or almost necessary? I have been told that it is.

Is there not a good deal of downright dishonesty among uS —getting more than one has a right to, or taking what belongs to someone else, or not giving full value for the work we are paid to do? It is very proper to want one’s rights . . . But to think more of rights than of duties is corrupting. It leads men, in the end. to exaggerate their rghts and to forget ther duties. To dishonour our agreements is a form of social dishonesty.