The Franklin Times PUBLISHED EVERY MONDAY, WEDNESDAY, AND FRIDAY AFTERNOON. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 29, 1927. HOSPITAL LEVY.

Franklin Times, Volume XVII, Issue 73, 29 June 1927, Page 4

The Franklin Times PUBLISHED EVERY MONDAY, WEDNESDAY, AND FRIDAY AFTERNOON.

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 29, 1927. HOSPITAL LEVY.

Office and Works: HALL STREET. PUKEKOHE. Telephone No. 2. P.O. Box. 14 “We nothing extenuate, nor aught set down in malice.”

YEAR by year the burden of the rate levied for hospital and charitable aid purposes becomes a greater burden, especially upon the rural ratepayer, who has to pay upon his land and dwelling, instead of merely upon his dwelling. The disgraceful extravagance of the Auckland Board, which in a few years has raised the cost per patient per day from seven shillings to over seventeen shillings, is the principal factor in the huge increase in the levy which has taken place during the past decade. Members of the Board have appeared to take it for granted that they had the purse of Fortunatus to draw upon, instead of that of needy farmers whose valuations have enormously risen under the system of assessing the unimproved value of land in accordance with the wildest flights Qf imagination the De-

partment can screw its valuers up to. While valuations have gone up, returns from land have, as a rule, gone down, and farmers, already heavily mulcted in road rates, have found their compulsory contributions to the Hosjpital Board have been steadily mount- : .ing, .until they 1 form ...an extremely > r heavy charge upon their: industry.: And to add to it all, he has the annoyance ■ of .'knowing that the greater .part of what is extracted from him is : spent not on his fiick ahd needy neighbours, but upon the sick and needy of the •City. ■■■ ' “It would mfike your blood y.un cold to see how New Zealand' hospital ’costs :• have mounted since money, came in said Inspector Love at a meeting of the Hospitals’ Association

■' ' ' * . , not only in their own country thnt j our Hospital Boards are notorious for waste and extravagance. Automatically! Probably that is what explains it most fully. When all'one has to do is to make an estimate of how much one would like to squander, and then make a levy for the amount upon a number of local bodies which cannot refuse to extort it from ratepayers with whom they can sympathise, but cannot assist, spending becomes a simple matter. And even so, if the money were spent for the benefit of the unfortunate patients, it would be possible to put up with a good deal, but when we know that much of it is squandered simply and purely for the benefit or the staffs, it is time to rebel. Anyone with any inside knowledge of the working of the Auckland institution knows that it is not merely overstaffed, hut that a huge sum of money has been spent in providing wholly unnecessary luxuries in the way of housing the staff. This is not merely extravagant, hut impolitic. To take girls from comparatively humble homes and place them in such luxurious quarters when many of them will return again to homes similar to the ones they were brought up in, cannot be considered wisdom. To expend upon the sleeping quarters of each nurse as much as suffices for a family of five or six of the people who have to pay for it is unjust, and economically unsound.

We have written so often about this subject that we are qfiite prepared to be met by the old sarcasm—- “ What a fine thing is a lute with one string.” But it is only by persistence that anything is accomplished. While our people are prepared to. sit down quietly and allow the burden, laid on them to be steadily .and progressively increased, they will be given plenty to carry. They should adopt the tactics of the camel,who begins to , scream as soon as he finds he is being too heavily loaded. We all know that picking out one particular class to bear this burden is a monstrous injustice, and cannot be, justified by any argument. Not farms, but individuals, go to the hospital to be cured. Not farms, but individuals, receive charitable aid. The cost of the system should come from the general taxpayer, and not from the ratepayer. When we reflect that Auckland City pays only 13 per cent, of the annual levy and: contemplate that fact in. contrast to the amount of hospital accommodation and public charity' afforded to inhabitants of the city, we need not. feel the .slightest delicacy about screaming as loudly as any camel in Arabia. . .