MUCH ADO?

Evening Star, Issue 22199, 29 November 1935, Page 8

MUCH ADO?

Dnsrirn the efforts of Mr F. Jones, M.P., to enlighten the public on Hospital Board administration, there must be many citizens who will not comprehend fully, the significance (if ■any) of the quick-firing and acrimonious exchanges which took place at last night’s meeting of the board between Dr W. Newlands and the parliamentary member for Dunedin South. It may bo remembered, however, that some time ago Mr Jones gave further evidence of the energy for which ho is noted by fossicking out-information about administrative business of tbo board relating to the handling of stores. As a member of the board he was quite at liberty to do this, but it is more than doubtful whether, in his capacity as a member of Parliament, ho was wise in raising in the House of Representatives a matter . which, without any public consciousness of less, could have been dealt with from a more or less domestic viewpoint. Moreover, Mr Jones’s zeal in prosecuting in public the case of an employee of the board who was charged with a misdemeanour involving the misuse of toll telephone calls to the extent of £S can be interpreted as an excess of zeal which, ett-pped by the allegation that ho was the source of inspiration for an elec-

tion newspaper that featured board business, no doubt accounts for the severe rebuke administered by Dr Newlands at last night’s meeting. Dr Newlands’s remarks savoured of patience exhausted. We think ho had a good case. The offending officer has been punished. Ho has made .restitution of the small sum involved and probably has suffered much mental pain as a result of the reprimand which he—a valued employee of the board—has received in the course of his service. On the other hand, we must accept Mr Jones’s word for it that he had not wanted to win an election contest by introducing- Hospital Board matters into the political campaign. The general trend of his political activities has reflected a desire to hide nothing from the public, and by this attitude the present case should bo judged. Now that a Labour Government is in power there will perhaps be no more talk of “scandals.” The public would be relieved if such a Utopian state could be attained.