THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. SATURDAY, MAY 24, 1890.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVII, Issue 8264, 24 May 1890, Page 4

THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. SATURDAY, MAY 24, 1890.

Is it the wish and intention of the Ministry that the speech of the Hon. T. Fergus, Minister of Public Works, reported in our papar of yesterday, shall be regarded as an official utterance, as, indeed, the programme of legislation for the forthcoming session The public ought to be entitled to take it as such. Of late, Ministers have made no disclosure of their intentions. The field was free, and the public have been waiting to hear what was to be done in the session now within a few weeks of being commenced. Ministers have, on various occasions, thrown up straws to see how the wind was blowing. They have just had several days' session together at Wellington, at which the outlines of the scheme of legislation for next session must have been drawn. Any Minister addressing his constituents so close to the meeting of Parliament, must be taken to speak for his colleagues as well as for himself. It would have been more satisfactory to have had this work done by the Premier, but we suppose he did not feel himself equal to it. Perhaps, indeed, any of the other Ministers would have been better than Mr. Fergus, but that

is their affair. They have chosen their spokesman, and are now bound by his utterances. Mr. Fergus naturally commences with the surplus. Now, we think the Government should be cautioned not to make quite too much of this surplus. It arises solely from the railway revenue, and the Customs, which are the best indication of a surplus arising from a renewal of prosperity, show a falling off from the estimate. However, there is a surplus, and an important part of the Ministerial policy should be to dispose of it in a way which will tend to lighten the burdens on the people, and so to conduce to a revival of prosperity. But that does not seem to be the Ministerial idea throughout the whole programme. Instead of endeavouring to nurse the surplus, and to make it go as far as possible in relieving taxation, the whole idea of the Government programme appears to be to find out new ways and means of raising money. In speaking of what is to be done with the surplus, Mr. Fergus says :—"There was the fact that throughout New Zealand the population was increasing so rapidly, and the advantages of the scholastic system were so largely utilised, that they urgently required considerable sums of money for the erection of schools. Before they could remit taxation they must provide for all charges resting on loan and the money required for school buildings." He goes on to state explicitly that it is the intention of the Government to set apart a sum of money this year, and probably for two or three years, for school buildings, "especially in some Sarta of New Zealand." This is blunder To. 1 If charges have been hitherto borne on loan, which ought to have been borne on revenue, then there is no proper surplus to that extent. It will be a plain confession of dishonest finance if the Government say here is a surplus of £115,000, but we have hitherto been paying ordinary costs of government out of loan, and as loan money is now exhausted, the surplus is swallowed up by these charges coming back as ordinary revenue. As to the other item, we say that the colony was expecting a diminution of the education vote instead of a huge augmentation. The statement by Mr. Fergus that the surplus is to be swallowed up in the maelstrom of the vote for education is sprung upon the colony as a surprise. Why did not Ministers throw up a few straws to see how the current of air went on this subject? If they had, Mr. Fergus would have saved one topic of his address. The great body of reflecting men in the colony hold that the education system, costing at least £400,000 every year, is far too expensive for the colony at present. That the Ministry should now come forward and declare that the education system must mop up the whole surplus, from which we expected relief from taxation, is monstrous. The statement they make is not true. There is no pressing necessity for new school buildings in any part of the colony, and as respects the North, which is made Mr. Fergus's plea, we are surely in a position to speak. Mr. Fergus then demolishes our hopes of a relief in taxation bysayingthatthere has been little talk on the subject in recent speeches. If public speeches are to be the guides of the Government in disposing of the surplus, we may ask where have been the speeches clamouring for the expenditure of money in school buildings ? Although there .has been no systematic agitation against the Property Tax, we defy Mr. Fergus to show a recent political utterance in which the speaker has not declared that if the Property Tax could be reduced it ought to be reduced in order to promote the welfare of the colony. But can Ministers not use their own eyes ? Do they not see that even yet, with all our increase of exports, the balance of population is still against us. and that more people are leaving the colony than are coming to it. There is only one thing to cure this, and that is to relieve the burdens which are pressing so heavily upon us. Mr. Fergus speaks of new school buildings being required because of increase of population ; but the population, even for school purposes, cannot be rapidly increasing if more persons are leaving the colony than are coming into it. The next subject dealt with is of great importance, but Mr. Fergus does not make it quite clear why he discourses so long upon it, and he does not tell us what the Government intend to do. The local bodies in the colony have, he says, borrowed five millions, for which they pay from 5 to 7 per cent., and he continues :—"lt was the duty of the Government to see if something could not be done by which, in future borrowing, loans should be issued with such restrictions that local bodies could obtain accommodation on more reasonable terms than at present." There is no clear meaning in this. Mr. Fergus would have spoken more to the purpose if he had said that hitherto the policy of the Government had been to forward and piomote by all means every Bill introduced to enable any paltry local body to go to the London market, but that in future Ministers would as a rnle oppose all borrowing powers sought to be obtained by local bodies. That would have been better than saying that the Government are anxious to see " that local bodies could obtain accommodation on more reasonable terms than at present." The nearest approach to anything practical which Mr. Fergus says is this:—"lf they could do anything at all to ease the minds of the people at homej or to ease the municipal taxpayer of the colony under the burden of the payment of interest, it would be a wise and statesmanlike act." We are left to take any meaning we can oat of that. There is much virtue in this if. Unfortunately, it would seem that nothing can be done to "ease the municipal taxpayer" except by placing his burden on the general taxpayer. The general taxpayer has already as much of a burden as he can very well stagger under ; and, besides, he objects to take over debts incurred for purposes he has no interest in, from which lie had never any chance of receiving any benefit, and which in many cases he protested against being incurred.

There are several other points in this new Ministerial programme to which we ought to refer, but we have not space in the present issue.