EDUCATING THE PUBLIC.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16203, 13 April 1916, Page 4

EDUCATING THE PUBLIC.

The report of, the Central Committee {'Mr British National Patriotic Organisation** gives prominence to the increasing necessity for a. campaign of vigilant, activity^ "against those who mislead the country by calling for a premature and patchwork Peace—a Peace which could but ensure the repetition be-we long of all the ruin, misery and slaughter that we ourselves have known." Mr. Asquith, Lord Rosebery and Mr. Balfour are the leading members of this committee, s<? that its warning is evidently not given without good cause. A " premature/ and patch-work peace" is, indeed, the only eventuality which can prevent the eradication of the German menace and deprive humanity of the fruits of its stupendous sacrifices.. Mistakes we can rectify, blunders we can amond, mismanagement we can reform, but to make an unsatisfactory peace would be to give Germtny ultimate and complete victory. That would be the unpardonable sin. Nor is there any doubt whatever that any danger there may bo of premature peace comes from those who have been disloyal in heart during all this agony of the world, not from those who have unhesitatingly sacrificed and unflinchingly suffered. The mere suggestion that righteous vie-, tory may be filched from us by " bo fatal and pestilent a policy" should excite throughout the Empire an ; iron' determination to continue the war a peace is won for which | it was worth dying. THE EAST COAST LINE.' * The Minister for Public V'-irks oxcuses the stoppage of wo k 'M tho J Gisborne line by stating t':at the vote for that construction has already been exceeded by £15,000. From this he reasons that "it was high time a temporary halt was called." Mr. Fraser's attitude emphasises the it is "high time" the Public Works" portfolio was in the hands of a minister appreciative of the North and sympathetic with the ; imperative need of the Dominion for the development of its natural resources. No railway construction favoured by a Minister is suspended merely .because the sum allocated thereto on the Estimates has been exceeded. Every public * >rb statement of the presei.t minister, as of his predecessors, Sm'Vwb th; on some railways the "0.-; <s nor. nearly s'pnt and that tu cc'-m it is greatly ' It i. ~uite -.stomary fc. these allocations to be made without any especial reference to the engineering situation and the Cabinet is authorised to transfer money thus voted by Parliament from one construction to another. The East Coast Ireopening up as it doot. a veritable province to settlement— be pushed forward and completed as rapidly and as energetically as possible, even though this should necessitate transfer c. money from the credit of the Otira Tunnel or some other .unprofitable and unnecessary construction,