The Government and the Highways.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 19736, 28 September 1929, Page 14

The Government and the Highways.

It is not often that it is so little necessary to pass a resolution as it was during the discussion yesterday by the South Island Motor Union of the raid on the Highways Board's funds. The Government has surrendered so completely to its critics that the Highways Fond controversy has ended as dramatically as it began, and because it has ended in complete surrender no one will wish to exploit the triumph politically. There is, however, one remark that it is not only fair but necessary to make, and that cannot be made too plainly. The motorists of the Dominion have won tu«nr case because the Government is not in a strong enough position politically to defy them. But their victory goes no further than this year's supplies. They have received " all they asked for" because what they asked for was their own, and could not be taken from them except in open and dangerous defiance of the principles of justice and fairplay. But political situations change, and if the situation next year is more favourable for the plunderer than it is now motorists will be in extreme danger again, since the itch of the politician to get his hands on unexpended sums of money and of the official to have larger and larger sums to spend never changes, and never ceases to be a peril to confiding citizens. If the motorists are wise they will not be satisfied with what " ceaseless activity and persistence" have achieved now, but will begin at once preparing for the struggle that lies only as far ahead as the first opportunist Government which has a clear majority.