WELLINGTON TOPICS

Hokitika Guardian, 2 December 1929, Page 3

WELLINGTON TOPICS

THE aM> tHeS-salary . cuts M \V^ (Special Correspondent.)

WELLINGTON, Nov. 28. The controversy that has been going on in the newspapers during the last few days concerning the “salary cuts” in the Civil Service has effectively established Mr H. E. Holland in the role of a live party leader that does things. During the recent session of Parliament Mr Holland showed . himself a greater factor than the. leader of His Majesty’s Opposition in shaping the course jof legislation) and so far in the recess he has allowed none of his activities to wane, getting apart all side issues that ih|ght' oohfuSe the' situation he appealsyto the Civil Servants to eschew tljje methods of the strike and to adhere to the methods of constitutional'effort. This is a wide- departure frOjn his attitude of sixteen years ago, but there is every reason to believe it is a genuine readjustment of Labour’s view, The strike everywhere has shown itself to be a defective weapon and Mr Holland has been among the first to confess it futility.

THE REFORM VIEW. The Right Hon. J. G. Coates, the leader of the Opposition, who happened to be in Wellington when the 1 appeal of the leader of the Labour Party was made, lost no time in prehis view of the position. The Party’s motion for the restoration of the Civil Servants “cut, he implied, was so much humbug. “There was,”, he said, “the quite unnecessary and irrelevant reference to the original ‘cut’ as ‘an unjust levy.’ This expression—in effect a vote of condemnation of the previous Government—could not have been x included for any other purpose than that of deterring Reform members from supporting it. . . It was suggested in the House that the wording of the motion might not have been the result of the unaided work of the Labour members.” This, obviously, was tantamount to an assertion that ■; .the United and Labour parties had \tWmpted to trick the Reformers inv/n denunciation of their own legislation. No wonder members of the United Party were a little indignant.

AN IRRESPONSIBLE VIEW

Erced from ilie Tesopnsibility ,of .office for the "> time, being,).and hay-. )ng dennjlished .S\fr - Holljind- : tPY' his .heart’s content, Mr -Coates proceeded to tell the' electors- what he would have done had they" stood by him last November. “Now that the half-year-ly figures arc available and the revenue found to be in a very healthy oondition,” he proclaimed, “I wish to state, with a full sense of responsibility, and with intimate knowledge both of the capacity of the Departments to pay and also of the struggles of the lower-paid officers of the Public Service, that I am prepared to increase by £ls per annum the maximum for men at £240, £205, and £295 limits. In saying this I know the feelings of my associates in Parliament.” All this was very fine and large in its way, but since 1922 Mr Coates and his colleagues had several opportunities to restore their “cuts” they imposed upon the Civil Service during the difficult years following upon the war. ■tardy reform.

Sir Joseph Ward, who had managed throughout the whole of his unfortunate illness to keep abreast of all political happenings of any consequence, wants to know why the Reform Government allowed six yean to elapse without making any effort to discharge its promise to restore the “cut.” . During that period it had secured five surpluses amounting to over £6,000,000 and had reduced taxation and charges at the rate of some £3,000,000 a year, but itbhad made no effort at all, on its own confession, to discharge its promises to the Civil Servants. The present Government had stated the position quite clearly and frankly and had pledged itself to discharge the obligations of its predecessors in office if circumstances permitted at the end of the financial year. This is a plain undertaking which if at all practicable, Sir Joseph will he glad to discharge, and meanwhile both Mr Holland’s remedy and Mi 1 Coates’s remedies may be held in abeyance without prejudicing' in any way the interests of the persons concerned immediately.