MINISTRY AT WORK

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVI, Issue 64, 13 February 1936, Page 6

MINISTRY AT WORK

ROUTINE AND PROBLEMS. LONG HOURS INVOLVED. / d ToWraph—Special to Standard.) (Bv iclcg “\>MM/LINGTON, Feb. 13. Members of the Labour Ministry are aiiion" the hardest working people in the country. Perhaps they did not realise all the cares of office when, nrior to the general election, they made so effectual a bid for Ministerial responsibility, but to-day, feeling the full pressure of problems new and old. they 1 are devoting long horns to office woik and many hours to joint discussions in the Cabinet room. No iournalist whose business bungs him in daily contact with a Minister lias heard complaints about over-work, but the fact is quite evident, and a few of the Prime Minister s colleagues aie showing traces of their unexpectedly heavy duties. So much centres on the Minister of Fina,nce. Hon. M Nash, that to the caller he is almost inaccessible, though he is at the office early and late. Other Ministers have found time to travel, but not the Minister of Finance, who finds so much to do that he cannot talk about it for the edification of newspaper readers. THE PRESSURE OF ROUTINE. After a Government has been some some years in office, it has considered so many questions of policy that the wheels run almost automatically, ■tnd decisions are quickly given. But that is not the case with an administration which set out to almost completely reverse the policy of its predecessors. Thus matters submitted for decision bv departmental heads cannot be disposed of in any brief sciutmy of t.ie official files. The new Minister has to start at the bottom —the latest contribution to a file is always at the lop „and li6 is obliged to considci jus decision in the light of the new policy. Consequently, a large number of administrative points which former Ministers could dispose of wxih the quick despatch of a mass-production machine have now to he closely considered and discussed. So masses of papeis pile up on Ministers’ desks, and department*;l heads find some difficulty in getting quick decisions, for the very good reason that their new Ministerial chiefs are wisely not going to be hurried into taking steps which might conflict with the wider issues under consideration of Cabinet as a whole. THOUSANDS OF LETTERS.

It is a well-known feature of Ministerial changes, even of individual Ministerial appointments, that this feature revives most of the forlorn hopes, of the past. Petitioners who have failed to convince a former Government hopefully raise their flag again when there is a new Caesar to wiioni to appeal. Hundreds of disappointed people have appealed to the new Ministers, and aiL their requests must be reported upon and sympathetically considered. Here is one of the burdens of the lew team.

Complimentary correspondence was piled on Ministerial desks for a month or so, and every letter had to be answered. This flood is over, but Ministers find their correspondence unduly heavy because thousands of people regard them as personally so sympathetic to the under-uog that they address all their complaints and requests to tl e Minister, rather than to any permanent official. As an example of how departmental correspondence has thus iur into a congested channel, the Minister of Labour (Mr Armstrong) told tiic “Standard’s” correspondent, as an interesting fact which did not annoy him, that for some time his daily mail bus been at the rate of 2000 letters. Wellington Ministers have a further call on their time in the larger number of interviews required than is the cast with colleagues whose constituents arj not close to Wellington. The Minister of Public Works (Mr Semple) is so favoured by this attention that outside his office in Parliament Building can be seen a row of half a dozen chairs, usually filled by patient people who hope to get a word with the Minister. Mr Semple has travelled a little more than most of his colleagues, an 1 thus he apparently gets his rest. BRIGHTENING UP. Another feature of the new Ministry’s advent is the brightening up of Paihainent Building. Under stress of limited finances, the former Government strictly limited expenditure on decorations, but their successors faced the position with a spirit of enterprise which lias kept busy for nearly three months a large staff of painters. Several Ministerial suites have been subjected to more than the usual spring cleaning, and one Minister pointedly reiused to occupy the suite allocated to him on the ground that it was so dii.’gv and dismal that it must be insar.’tary. He was hardly exaggerating the matter. One of the dullest of suites in the building was that of the Leader of the Opposition, but the new Government is making a very happy gesture to its successors by completely redecorating the rooms in bright tones, and overhauling all the furniture, possibly in the hope that the new occupant, Mr Forbes, will be content to stay in those quarters for a very long time.

“FIRST THINGS FIRST.” With daily routine duties sufficient to take their whole time, and the responsibility for initiating new policies, it might be thought that Ministers are becoming restive under the strain. This, however, does not seem to be the case. All the problems they have promised to handle are not being tackled simultaneously. “First things first” declared the Prime Minister a few days before he took office, and by firmly deciding not to handle a number of important questions until a few more urgent ones are ready for legislative action, members of the Government are avoiding the fate of hopeless over-work. Cabinet has its subcommittees for the hammering out of details of policy, and much material has gone to the law draftsman tor preparation of legislation. An expert committee taken from the Public Service and Commission of Agriculture is working out details of the operation of guaranteed prices for dairy products, and there is an important sub-commit-tee ot Cabinet concerned in the outstanding problem of the new finance. Labour’s official policy statement shows how radical is the outlook of this committee. “To control industry,” declared that statement, “is to control the body; to control the financial system is to control the nerve system that operates all. Labour will stand or fall by its ability to control the financial system.”