The Evening Star MONDAY, OCTOBER 26, 1908.

Evening Star, Issue 13091, 26 October 1908, Page 4

The Evening Star MONDAY, OCTOBER 26, 1908.

Tee speech delivered on Friday by Mr G. M. Thomson, who is stand,lr ing for Dunedin North in G. If. Thornton's the Opposition interest, conCandidature, firms j n T icws wo ex . pressed some weeks ago, when, ho announced his candidature and notified the general trend of his opinions to a semi-private meeting of prospective supporters. He need not repeat our eulogistic references to the good repute Mr 'Thomson has earned and the admirable work he has performed as educationist and practical philanthropist. As the Mayor said on Friday, " his personal character is of such a k mature that oVen those who are against , him in politics must respect him as a citizen and a good man.” Nor is it necessary to restate the considerations which led us to describe his candidature as “ academic,” and to suggest that his new ambition was -of the nature of an error in judgment. Our view is unchanged, but we are ready to waive the question of general suitability, and (as he evidently wishes) to take him seriously as a politician and an aspirant for parliamentary honors. If a-majority of the j electors of Dunedin North desire to be represented by a reactionary, who is utterly out of sympathy with Liberal sentiment and policy, Mr Thomson will find himself at the top of the poll. "He had been called a Conservative,” ho observed on Friday. That was an awful thing to call a man! " But not much meaning attached to the terms 1 Liberal ’ and ‘ Conservative.’ ” There is nothing awful or personally disparaging in the term, which Mr Thomson inferenttally deprecates; it is a plainly descriptive term, and the sufficiently obvious differences which separate “Liberals” from Conservatives ’ are not to bo explained away by an irrelevant and misleading sneer at "men who claim to be Liberal.” H bother he be a Conservative or not, Mr Thomson admits that ho is “in sympathy with the Opposition” and opposed to the Liberal Government, though he is “not an Oppositionist out and out, and certainly “not a party man.” In spite of this disclaimer, we must be allowed to hint that Mr Thomson s partisanship is by no means imperfectly developed. He told his hearers that “the Government had debauched the community in a political sense,” and his failure to support this very serious charge 5y any specific evidence was quite in keeping with the usual practice of anti-Minis-terialist partisanship. He hazarded the purely imaginative assertion that the Minister of Lands was “inclined to Socialism,” and (three days after the Palmerston North speech!) pleasantly suggested that the main plank of the Government policy was “to stop in power.” If Mr Thomson is neither a Conservative, nor an “ Oppositionist out and out,” nor a “ party man,” the task of trying to place him most be given up as a bad job.

i It cannot be said that Mr Thomson was | much more convincing when he came to deal with definite subjects in detail. His ! adoption of the current crudities of Opposition criticism regarding finance in general, i and the Public Debt in particular, may be ignored, with a passing suggestion that he should study £>ir Joseph Ward’s speeches; but something may be said concerning his reference to the question of railwav policy. Here, again, a word of counsel will not be out of place. Let Mr Thomson read tlrrough the speech delivered by the 'Minister of Railways in the Financial Debate. He will find it in ‘Hansard,’ No 8 (July 24), and he will also find that his criticisms and misgivings are quite superfluous. The Howe street audience were assured that the railway revenue was equal to 3.45 per cent, or the capital cost, while the country was paying 4 per cent, on the loans; that large items of expenditure were improperly charged against capital instead of revenue, “ 30 tho accounts were set out farrly ‘‘and squarely, the net revenue would be “found to be much lower, probably about 3 per cent. ; that a private concern rnn on the same lines would soon be bankrupt; and that better results were secured in the Australian States. Mr Hall-Jones’s speech, just mentioned, contains conclusive answers to each of these criticisms. Mr Thomson’s statements and inferences are alike wrong. The salient fact is that the New Zealand railways are not a private concern. The public are users and owners; and if they have to pay something more in interest than is actually earned by tho railways the difference is returned to them in cheap fares and other facilities. Sir Joseph Ward pointed out at Palmerston North that the total concessions since 1895 (when the State resumed control) were equivalent to the enormous sum of £2,674,000. As regards th> alleged improper charges against the capital account, the facts are directly opposite to what Mr Thomson supposes them to be. It is true that last year the railways earned only 5.33 per cent, on the capital cost (Mr Thomsons 3.45 relates to the previous year), but Mr Hall-Jones’s explanation should be borne in mind: Referring to tho question of interest earned on the capital cost of the railways —the interest falling from 3.45 per cent, to 5.33 per cent.—honorable members who have spoken before now have reminded those who criticised tho failing og in the percentage that some years ago—l think as far back at 1896-^—the Government indicated that they would look for a return of 5 per cent, on the railways, and that when the earnings were beyond that further concessions to the users of the railway would be made. That has been the practice followed. So much for the general principle of policy, which, of course, Mr Thomson may declare to be a wrong one, though he would find it difficult to justify his opinion. But what will he say to the following passage in reference to tho vexed question of capital and revenue ? Now, there has been a greater mileage of relaying of rails dnring th© last year than ever before in the history of the department; and, mark you, this has all been done out of revenue. We put in last year 2(7,600 tons of rails; we used nearly 50,000 more sleepers than for the previous year; and we; put 57,000 tons more ballast on. the lines than in the previous year, apart from any other extra work done. Supposing we had done the same as is done in the Old Country and in the Australian colonies—charged relaying as additions to open li ~*r imtftrl «l Mo ju-

return would have been not A4S> but at least 3.70. But because we n»Te done_this extra work and taken adva®wgo of the good returns to put the raawjtjns m a better position out of revenue, the honorable member andpMns. As, regards the comparison between New Zealand and the Australian' States, Mr HallJones cited figures showing that in our servioe the employees receive better wages and work fewer hourej and that the passenger fares and goods freight® on the Dominion railways are appreciably lower than in Austra.ra. So that the “better reentta” which are obtained in Victoria, New South Wales, and South Australia can be secured here if we de four things—(l) reduce wages, (2), increase hours of work on the railways, (3) increase fares and freights, and (4) transfer to the capital account certain charges now debited against revenue. Does Mr Thomson recommend such alterations in principle and practice? We need offer no apology fbr having dealt with this question at sotna length, seeing that, the Opposition candidate for Dunedin North is not the only seeker after parliamentary honors who has misrepresented the situation. In Mr Thomson s case, we are sure, the misrepresentation is umntentional, but be -must expect to go astray if he adopts the stock allegations of his party without studying the Ministerial replies.