DEPARTMENTAL ALLOWANCES

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIV, 6 August 1931, Page 9

DEPARTMENTAL ALLOWANCES

SOME BIG FIGURES r I i • Among many odd grants of money in the Government's Estimates of expen- ' dilure for the current, financial year, tho i most astounding are the hundred votes i under the general item “travelling nl- | lowaneos and expenses" for administra- ' tors and public servants (comments the j “Press”). These grants aggregate , £2013,125, so large a sum that it is j natural to look in the pages set aside ( for “remarks” for tho word of npologv or defence which seems to he required, j There is of course none. Arid this ex- | pendituro does not include the high cost i of motor-cars, oil, maintenance, and re- ; ncwal. Sums under tlioso headings appear separately throughout the mass ol Departmental votes; hut it would take a public servant, a day at least to reckon up tho large total cost.. In addition there, is a grant of £25,000 for railway passes and concessions to members and ex-members of the Legislature. families, and relations; and there is also a vole of £1250 for railway sleeping berths for .Members of Parliament, while £I4OO morn is provided for tlm fares of legislators and their wives travelling to and from Wellington. Moreover, tho sum of £2750 is granted to the, Host Office account, for franked Government telegrams, telephone communications, and Ministerial telegraph’, c memoranda. But salaries and nlk,wances to members and their horde of attendants do not completo the bill for the upkeep of a national luxury. Ten thousand pounds lias to he spout oil tho printing ot Parliamentary panel's —an out lav partly recoverable—and "once the politicians have talked, tho recording and publication of their wisdom costs £11,895 a year. They are also given an allowance for stamps, and the Post Office is refunded £I2OO, being the difference between special and ordinary telegrams. There is no vote this yoar, however, for the treatment of M.P.’s at the Rotorua Spa, and £5 only was spent on baths for them there last year. Crimo presses politics hard for prominence in expenditure. The vote for the travelling expenses of police and tho transport of j prisoners is £14,500. The maintenance 1 of prison departmental motor vehicles costs £4500, including £4200 for allowances to officers who use their own cars. Juries are expected to cost £3750, and £5200 is allowed for witnesses’ expenses, which will be “heavier than anticipated owing to several murder cases.” The increased population of the prisons necessitated an incroaso of the grant (£11.000) to prisoners’ dependants. In ovory Department of the State the estimates bristle with items which raise the question of economy; but there is ono allowance that no harassed taxpayer would challenge. It is a vote of £4OO to the special officer who inspects bonedust in India, in order lo prevent tho export of anthrax to this country. Unliko tho pith-helmeted officials in West- 1 ern Samoa he is not even given a tropical allowance.