FIFTY YEARS AGO

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 30, 3 August 1940, Page 9

FIFTY YEARS AGO

ITEMS FROM THE "POST"

A LOST OPPORTUNITY

"No one interested in the progress and prosperity of this colony can read the cabled account of the opening of the Mining. Exhibition at South Kensington without a feeling of regret and shame that New Zealand is not mentioned at all,"- remarks "The Post" of this date-fifty years ago. "There is nothing in the Exhibition to suggest the idea that such a colony as New Zealand exists, even much less than that it is scarcely, if at all, inferior to New South Wales in its natural mineral wealth. New South Wales, we are told, shows samples of every known mineral. New Zealand, perhaps, could not do this just at present, for its mineral resources are not so well developed as those of the elder colony, but if proper steps had been taken New Zealand might at South Kensington have made a display of auriferous ores, iron, tin, copper, antimony, cinnabar, virgin gold, coal, marble, asbestos, and other minerals as would have excited a good deal of attention, notwithstanding the magnificent collection from New South Wales. The colony might have shown enough to form a magnificent advertisement of the vast natural wealth which lies beneath our soil awaiting capital and skill to turn it. to account. New Zear land has lost a great-opportunity, and we are at a loss to understand how it is that, with the Agent-General's Department in London and a Minister of Mines and a Mining Department here, no effort whatever,seems to have been made to have the colony properly represented at the Mining Exhibition now being held, and of which all the other colonies seem to have taken more or less advantage. A question in Parliament might elicit some information from the Minister of Mines." PUBLIC SERVICE ASSOCIATION. "Although keeping studiously aloof from all interference in the party politics of the day, the Public Service Association, which was formed the other night, may nevertheless become and should become an important factor in promoting good government in the colony. Hitherto the Public Service has been a house many times divided against itself. It has been split up into factions and cliques, it has been riven by internal jealousies and dissensions, and it has never learned to respect itself. There has been nothing in the nature of esprit de corps developed amongst its members, and instead of being proud of belonging to the service members have never lost an opportunity of deploring its disadvantages and lamenting the uncertainties of their position. Successive Ministries have delighted in affording evidence of the insecure tenure of office in the service, and have endeavoured to create the idea of a personal service rather than a national one, by making officers believe they are the personal servants and dependants of the Ministers in power, instead of servants of the country. There has been a great deal too much cringing and crawling in the service, and too great facility afforded for obtaining promotion by such illegitimate means, instead of by good, honest, straightforward work. We hope that the formation of the Association, so happily..inaugurated the other night, will alter all this, and that members of the service will recognise their legitimate responsibilities andf priyir leges as units of a great body. They must learn to respect themselves and the service they belong to as the first step towards gaining the respect of the public for the service. Never was there a case where there has existed greater opportunity for reform and reorganisation, , for the service is at present at the lowest possible ebb, demoralised, disorganised, disunited, and powerless—a kind of football for everyone to kick; its members without heart or hope, aware that they exist only on-sufferance, that they have nd security of' tenure, and that a snatch vote in the House may, no matter their position or length of service, cast them adrift, or arbitrarily reduce their pay at. any moment. It is impossible for the country to be well served while its Public . Service is in this condition, and we therefore hail with pleasure the movement which tends to provide a remedy for the present evils, raisethe service to. a proper position, and establish it on a secure and firm base."' BILLS. "The deputation of employers who waited upon the Hon. Mr. Hislop in regard;to the Factories arid Shops Bill might almost as well have saved themselves the trouble. They were fully armed'with many strong and cogent objections to the Billj as originally framed, but they might quite as profitably have explained these to the first policeman they met or to the reporters alone, as to the Honourable the > Minis-, ter of Education. There are two reasons for this. In the first place the Bill stands referred to a Select. Committee which is likely to entirely remodel it - and remove many of the highly pbj ectionable features with which the original bristled; and, in the second place, because Mr. Hislop, although nominally in charge of the Bill,, knows little and cares less as to its contents. We do not for one moment suppose that he will trouble himself to, "represent the objections of the deputation to the committee. It was1 only the near approach of a General Election, the conviction that something must be done this session to regain their lost popularity, that suddenly awoke the zeal of Ministers for the amelioration of the condition of the industrial classes, as evinced in the introduction of these Labour Bills. Their action is not really sincere. They io not care one jot or tittle whether :hese reforms are passed or not, or whether any reforms are effected. They lave'simply made a daring bid for popularity, and to gain- support which ivill ensure them a continuance of )ffice they are willing to pander to any rry or to any demand which they.beieve is strongly supported. As a mat;er of fact, Ministers would probably rather see these Bills thrown out than passed. It would form a fresh opportunity for bidding for popularity.. At iie hustings they could expatiate on the »reat things they would have done and ;ried to do, but were prevented from Ibing. They would much prefer to trust in that gratitude which consists 3f a lively sense of favours,to come, than the colder feeling evolved by favours already conceded."