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New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9014, 29 March 1888, Page 4

Ijr our telegraphic columns it will be seen that the Government of New South Wales has resolved on erecting smelting works for dealing with ores in bulk. This is a recognition of the importance which the new discoveries in Australia have given to the mining industry in the public mind ; for'it is in a sense a new departure, and distinctly a violation of what are commonly accepted as the orthodox principles of political economy. According to these, such direct intervention on the part of the State is an interference with private interests that is unwarrantable ; and it can be sneered at as "paternal," or even "grandmotherly" Government. All the same it is a procedure in which probably every class of the community is beneficially interested, and if economic principles are opposed to it, then so much the worse for the principles. We are not in a position to say how far the Government at Sydney may have been called on to take this course. It is understood that Australian ores are not particularly refractory, and one might have thought that private enterprise should have been able to cope with the necessities of the position. But, if the New South Wales Government has felt justified in erecting smelting works for the public good, what shall we say ot the New Zealand Government in the face of the sigularly refractory character of our ores in the ThamesCoromandel Peninsula. Here private persons and private parties have been allowed to risk ana often lose their fortunes in the endeavour, by costly and doubtful experiments, to solve the problem of how best to reduce ores that are in unlimited quantity but of stubborn character. Had they been successful, no doubt they would have had their reward, but all others engaged in mining would have profited equally from their labours ; while from one end of the colony to the other the benefits of an extraordinary revival of mining would have been felt. If ever there was a case in which the Government of a country would have been justified, as trustee tor the whole people, in taking on itself the cost of employing the best skill and best appliances for solving a question of public interest, it was this. But instead of that there has been exhibited the narrowest and most indifferent spirit in relation to mining development ; Ministers have deemed that they were fulfilling their duty in successfully repelling importunate applicants; and anything done has been on the meanest and most unsatisfactory scale, while mountains literally full of gold and silver, but stubbornly retaining these precious metals, have

been left to be struggled with by the unaided, and to a large extent futile, efforts of private enterprise. We do not hesitate to say that this has been a shortsightedness in policy, an unreasoning adherence to antiquated restrictions on State action, that has been exceedingly discreditable to the Government of New Zealand ; but -as precedent is all-powerful with certain orders of intelligence, we are not without hope that this action on "the part of the Government of the mother colony may have the effect of relaxing the hidebound principles of political economy that restrain the action of Government, and that Ministers may come to see that it is as politically admissable as it is wise for the State to take on it the duty of dealing with the difficulty involved in our refractory ores, and so removing the barrier that is keeping back a floodtide of prosperity from the colony.