BRITAIN AWAKENING

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue LXXIV, 29 August 1919, Page 5

BRITAIN AWAKENING

POLiOJT OF ECONOMY

CAMPAIGN AGAINST WASTE,

* SIR AUCKLAND GEDDES ON THE COAL PROBLEM.

BY CABLi—±*KKSB AatJoeiA'riOS—UOPYEIGHI „ tl . . LONDON, Aug. 28. Mr Lloyd George's ultimatum has consternation, at Whitehall. The whoteeale dismissal oi: so-called "limj>et«" has begun in th e War Omce and .Admiralty. Many more will receive .notice on September 1. Mr Lloyd George, an a letter to a member oi the House of Commons vigorously protests against charges of ex.iravagant finance and faulty administration, involving the loss of Government prestige. It cannot, he says be too strongly emphasised that the prim--ary duty' of controlling departmental ■expenditure rests with the Minister and not with the Treasury. The only way of ensuring Ministers co-operating .= with Treasury control lies in the establishment of collective responsibility, which the abolition of Cabinet governments seems to have entirelv de■^pctroyed. «& The newspapers continue their antiwaste campaign. They have unearthed a new example in Poole harbor, where, against expert advice, a quarter of a million was expended in 1918 in order to provide an alternative port for <«ross-Channel traffic. It was subsequently discovered that shipping was ■unable to cross the bar of the harbor >during gales, and the work was abandoned. The harbor was not used.

It is also pointed out that scores of :good engines and hundreds of waggons are idle at the Leeds depot, whilst a rast quantity of army and' air force •-stores ie rusting in a derelict depot at Dideot, which covers eight square miles. There are thousands of ambulance waggons, water-carts, gun carriages and limbers axle-deep in the mud. Millions of wash-leather gloves were tied in bundles and used as footballs.

LONDON, Aug. 27. Sir Auckland Geddes, interviewed, said he was sure the first and greatest danger lies in the decline of the coal output, which was necessary to secure the restoration of Europe. British "trade cannot recover unless Europe re--covers, despite the fact that Europe is .apt the only market. British manufacturers, employers, and -workers must -appreciate the essential fact that Britain's unsatisfactory economic position *can be alleviated only by greater pro--duction. find should aim at exporting £100,000,000 worth monthly.