PUBLIC AFFAIRS.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLII, Issue 7374, 28 January 1902, Page 2

PUBLIC AFFAIRS.

The speech delivered by Sir Joseph Ward at Greymouth was in his usual cheerful style, and, co far as it goes, was highly satisfactory, though most of it was on lines with which the people are familiar. Again we are told that the Government have given the people co muoh by this concession and so muoh by that, but the fact remains that the amount taken by the Government from the people in taxation is greater in volume than ever previously in the history of the colony, and, if the surpluses are genuine, a great deal more than has been necessary for carrying on the services of tbe country. If the money has not been taken in one way it has been in another, and what we fear the accounts would show, if duly investigated, is that the large increase has been spent as fast as it has come in} and much of it in a most extravagant fashion. We have had an era of good prices and high spending power, and that has sent the revenue up, but all history will be falsified if this is not shown to be an abnormal I

state of affairs, and meanwhile permanent charges have been added to the expenditure, which may be seriously felt whenever occurs the inevitable turn in the tide. The talk about the policy of the Government having reduced interest and added valu<) to land is, to a %cry great bxtenl, mere padding. Money has been just as cheap, prospeiity has been just as remarkable, and the increase in the value of property jusfc as great iv colonies where Ministers make no ' such claim. The Australian colonies and Canada are cases in point, particularly the latter, whose trade returns for the latt few years show phenomenal expansion. Pubic [prosperity depond3 maiDJy, tot on aofcsof Parliament, tut on economical conditions, and the prudent man Jooks at the prepeat trend of these conditions, and not at their past effects, for gaiJance as to the future. In view of the present outlook for prices of wool and meat, two of our great lines of exports, there should be a disposition to carefulness, and this quality, according even to some Governmeut supporters, Ministers are not showing; forch very conspicuously. Certainly at Greymouth Sir Joseph Ward had little else to say, but " Let us eat, drink, and be merry, for to-morrow " — will take care of itself.