THE GOVERNMENT PRINTING.

Evening Post, Volume XXII, Issue 5, 6 July 1881, Page 3

THE GOVERNMENT PRINTING.

TO THE EDITOR OP THB EVENING POST. Sir — Some days since you adverted very Bhortly to tho expense of tho Government Printing Office, and as a good deal has been said at other times on the same subject, perhaps the following suggestions founded on what is done in other places may prove useful. You gave the circulation of Hansard at 2500. This is a truly enormous circulation for so small a population, and must of course be gratuitous, and as a sequitur three-fourtli3 wasted. I suggest its gratuitous circulation be cut down to 750, or less, and its price be reduced to tho cost of tho paper (only I suppose about threcponca). I also suggest that all Acts and Bills of the General Assembly be sold for the price of the paper they are printed on (they must be printed), and that their present broadcast distribution be put a stopto ; that all Parliamentary papers and other similar documents have printed on their outside or title page the cost of compilation (if any), number printed and ooat of paper, and cost of printing (composition and presswork) ; and that they be sold for a trifle above their value a<j waste paper, and their gratuitous circulation materially reduced ; that the Govornmont Gazette be made a paying concern by charging a proper price (paying price) for advertidemonts of every description, and that its circulation be strictly confined to subscribers and a few of the Government offices it may be necesBary to supply, and that its price be reduced to Id or 2d per number, as the advertisements should pay cost of printing. 1 think the adoption of these changes would materially reduce the co«t of the printing office. * They are all in vogue in one or other of the colonies. — I am, &c, Printer.