The Dominion. TUESDAY, MAY 4, 1909. THE PUBLIC SERVICE.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 498, 4 May 1909, Page 4

The Dominion. TUESDAY, MAY 4, 1909. THE PUBLIC SERVICE.

■■■■\lt is extremely unfair 5 of the Peime MIKISTEB to keep! the.public in the dark as to the full details of his plan ,for effecting economics in the Civil Service. Several weeks haye elapsed since the Government published the.first batch of re: tirements; under,.the.:. age-limit, and since the partial disclosures wore made by Sir ''.Joseph Ward , in bis speech at Upper Hutt Most people expected that a large portion of his Invercargill mani-> festo would be given up: to a full exposi-' tion; of the'tjovernment's intentions. The ■public felt that it had : a right to know ■ how/the" saving, of £250,000' was' to ,be. ef-: fected,' and the Civil' Servants themselves were entitled to know.how they would be .affected. Prime : Minister wasi quite vague and inconclusive; ■ The public ie.still in the. andthe Civil .Seryice* is still, in. a state of anxiety and 1 doubtA Nobody wishes to hurry tho Government in- this important matter,':, but ,, .'the 'PniME Minister and -his- colleagues : havo had months: in which to perfect their: plans. .As'we have throughout been urging that-the'.work of retrenchment should be carried out with a minimum of friction; and hardship, we are glad to have the Prime Minister's l assurance that "none of those who will be affected will bo turned out during ,tho winter," and that "in such cases as retirement is found necessary, they will bo compensated for a porioci which" will cover • it ; [the • winter season],". That is satisfactory news, and many Civil Servants will breathe'the easier for hearing it. But-we are afraid; that this, reassurance implies 'that the Government is still in the.process of making up its mind as to its intentions. Sir Joseph; Ward's persistent statement that tho saving which is contemplated will' amount to a quarter of a million does not in any way suggest that, ho has very definite ideas in tho matter. Nothing moro need bo deduced from it than that he feels that a quarter of a million is a safo guess. ■ .■-.:'■' ' '.. . , It is worth' while looking at the figures that display the growth of Departmental extravagance, since it is from them that the extent of tho saving required to be made must' bo deduced. The first thing to bo noted is that an ultimate saving of a quarter of a million a .year ; is quite inadequate to,the needs of the situation. Sir Joseph Ward attempted to persuade his Invercargill audience that nothing moro is necessary than to roduco tho ox-

, penditure by a little more than the amount of the drop in Customs revenue. The Customs revenuo has nothing to do with the question. The disease to bp cured is the independent growth of the P cost of the Departments, tho appalling rise in the "annual appropriations." The public must not confuse this branch of the, national expenditure with expenditure on public works or with the permanent appropriations. The figures relate to ? the cost of administration. In 1900 tho r annual appropriations totalled £2,854,809. 5 The.total has risen year by year,, the latest known totals being as follow :— « Seddon Government. Increase j " over ' ' previous r ' year. £ £ !, ' 1905 ... ... 3,964,930 144,'566 ■ 1906 ...: ... 4,252,233 287,303' r. ■ ■: . Waed Government. - . 1907 ;. 4,736,806 454,573 i, 1908 ... ... 6,085,344 348,538 ,_ For the year, just ended there has been another large increase, but, as usual, the E Prime Ministes has kept back the actual ! ' amount. To save a quarter of a million ._ will only be to save, portion of one year's normal increase under the extravagant £ methods of the past. What tho country ••■ requires is not a paltry saving of less j. than a twentieth of. the bloated cost of r _ the Departments in the past year, but a saving that will bring the expenditure E down to the point at- which it would j stand if .the staggering extravagances shown in the last column of our table 3, had not been indulged in. ,We can only 6 guess at,,how much .of those increases j prudence would have saved: • it. is at least obvious that the total 1 is vastly greater than the quarter of a million which the D Peiue Ministee appears to consider it a r, stupendous feat of economy to save. If 5 we estimate the annual' appropriations i] for the,past year at over £5,300,000, we shall see, remembering that the figures in r -. 1899 were £2,696,405, that the cost of the Departments has. just about doubled hr r. ten years 1. The saving we suggest is not confine'd only to salaries, but to ex- *, : travagances connected with the adminisr| tration of the various Departments. So far as we have been able tolearn, the G Government has failed to take the p heads _of Departments into . its confir; dence in'dealing with the question. Ministers are acting without proper advice, at * least in some cases. This is extremely r foolish on their part, and does not hold out promise of the best results.: What the K. Prime Minister has to do is, not to try and balance the fall 'in Customs duties, r> but to purge the whole system of govern-. menfc of the rank'abuses cultivated to '; keep "Liberalism" in power/: Frankly;''wo do riot think he has-the constancy and patriotism necessary to dp it.