THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. WEDNESDAY, MARCH 10, 1909. THE WAYS OF MINISTERS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 14005, 10 March 1909, Page 6

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. WEDNESDAY, MARCH 10, 1909. THE WAYS OF MINISTERS.

In the recent reorganisation of the Cabinet, two of the most important of portfolios and two' particularly affecting the North,lsland—those of Public Works and Mines—were handed to a member of Parliament, who has lately been paying his first visit to this great province. It was vaguely hoped that, although this allocation of office was on the face of it entirely unjust to the North, Mr. R. McKenzie would rise to his responsibilities and would manifest a disposition to appreciate the requirements of this province and a capacity for administration which would result in the advancement of great public interests. It has not taken very long for these hopes to be dissipated. Mr. R. McKenzie has displayed an astonishing lack of sympathy with the North, and. an utter inability to grasp the salient features of the various situations with which he has been confronted. He goes to Waihi and promptly commences to threaten one of ■ the greatest of our national industries because ■ tailings are dumped into a stream the valley of which has little agricultural value, . and which might be kept open without great difficulty by the occasional employment of a Government dredge- The employment of many hundreds of,men, the distribution of hundreds of " thousands of pounds yearly in wages, the payment of dividends which encourage gold-adventuring not only at Waihi-but on other fields, seem to have weight in the mind of the "new Minister for Mines as compared with the agricultural. use of a few inferior acres—and this while the Government' carefully locks from use millions of the most fertile acres in the North. On the Thames, he exhibits the same cavalier temper, employing his new-born authority to threaten mining companies which have great interests at stake and great difficulties to contend with in making arrangements for developing the low levels. , At Auckland, he professes to be ignorant that we have any reason to attach a Mining School to our University College. In the matter of the Stratford connection, he speaks contemptuously of. the claim that, work should be carried on at both ends, and asks settlers why they need communiea tion with Auckland when they can send their goods to New Plymouth. We have no rivalry with. New Plymouth and have nothing to lose but much to gain r from the legitimate progress of that port, but settlers obviously prefer to rail to Auckland wherever possible for the simple reason that it is a great port and offers them " much greater - advan ■ tages • than any secondary port can possibly offer. In any case, it is not the business of Government to interI fere between ports, and we cannot | think that in this, or in other questionable assertions, Mr. R. McKenzie is the spokesman of the Cabi- ' net. , The extreme probability iB that he is carred away by his sudden elevation to office, and has not the intelligence either to conceal his ignorance of the North or to understand that there should be such a thing as a consistent and public-spirited Government policy.

There is, however, this' excuse for a very ordinary politician suddenly entrusted with two portfolios, whose contents deal principally with districts far removed from his limited and local experience, that Sir Joseph Ward has not organised his policy in any Department in a definite manner. The circumstances of our Prime Minister's accession to office may explain how this has been neglected, but since he has passed through the test of a general election and holds office by the direct approval of the majority of the electorates, we may fairly urge upon Sir Joseph this administrative ■ duty. As things are, every new man who- is called to the Cabinet and. entrusted with the control of a Department considers himself a temporary dictator, and emits decrees as though he were a Departmental Tsar. Mr. Millar comes North, and in the face of the statistical fact that . our 1101 miles of Northern ; railway yield -a far greater revenue than the 1542 miles

of ' Southern railway, 1 threatens to suspend the running of much-needed trains, and refuses to make reasonable improvement because, forsooth, he intends to make the railways pay —at our Northern expense. Similarly, when a politician is appointed Minister for Lands, he calmly proceeds to upset all our national customs and' to legalise theories to which only a small minority are committed, but which the Parliamentary majority is called upon to support. Mr. R. McKenzie is in very plentiful if not in very good company when he proceeds to play fast and loose with : the legitimate interests that have so unhappily come under his care. We would ask Sir Joseph Ward if this is done with his consent and approval. Does the Prime Minister consider, for instance, that the work on the Stratford connection should be concentrated upon the Taranaki end, to the exclusion of the Main Trunk from share in the local business, and to the confiscation of the, trade which would come to Auckland, over the Main Trunk, were-' work carried on at both ends, as it ought to bel Many matters of detail must necessarily be left to individual Ministers, but matters of general policy, ouoiht surely to be determined by the Go-, vernment as a whole and endorsed by the Prime Minister, whom the country considers responsible for the general policy of the Government. Otherwise, every Southern Minister, elevated to brief authority by the chances of party politics, may come touring Northward without any purpose but to display his power* and to win the sycophantic applause which can always be secured by those .who ignore public interests and private rights. This is not sound administration. It is not even good party policy. Moreover, it nourishes that sectional antagonism which Sir Joseph so often denounces but which his ill-disciplined and ill-informed henchmen do their best to keep alive.