REDUCTIONS IN AGENCY-GENERAL.

Evening Post, Volume XXII, Issue 24, 28 July 1881, Page 2

REDUCTIONS IN AGENCY-GENERAL.

? It will be remembered that a very determined effort was made last session to reduce as much as possible the expenses of the London Agency-General for this colony. Acting on this strongly-expressed wish of Parliament, the Government wrote to Sir F. Dillon Bell immediately on his entering on the appointment of Agent-General, intimating that Parliament had voted only J23000 for the year's expenses of the department, and urging him to effect without delay such reductions as would bring the cost of the department within that limit. Sir F. D. Bell, writing from L ondon on 19th May last, states that he has done his best to bring ttie expenditure within the limit indicated, but found it absolutely impossible. He pointed out that in the letter suggesting the directions the reductions should take, the Government put down only .£360 for "' rent and contingencies." But the rent of the London offices alone, under lease, amounts to J2400, and the contingencies during the last nine years had averaged over .£350, of which postage alone exceeded iJIOO annually. It would, therefore, be impracticable to compress those items — the rent, moreover, being a sum fixed by lea 3e — into the amount named by the Government. He accordingly requests that £3500 may be put on the Estimates for the ensuing year, and promises to do his best not to spend it all. To this suggestion the Government acceded.