CAMPAIGN AGAINST WASTE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVI, Issue 17251, 29 August 1919, Page 7

CAMPAIGN AGAINST WASTE.

SENSATIONAL DISCLOSURES. DERELICT ARMY STORES. USELESS HARBOUR BUILT. By Telegraph— Association—Copyright. (Received 12.5 a.m.) A and N.Z. . LONDON, Aug. 28. Mr. Lloyd George's ultimatum regarding the reduction of Departmental staffs has caused consternation at Whitehall. Wholesale dismissals of so-called "limpets" have begun at the War Office and Admiralty. Many more will receive notice on September 1. Mr. Jiloyd George, in a letter to his colleagues, vigorously protests against extravagant finance and faulty administration, involving a loss of Government prestige. It cannot be too strongly emphasised, I he states, that the primary duty of" controlling Departmental expendi- : ture rests with the Minister not with j the Treasury. The only way of ensuring that Ministers co-operate with I the Treasury in the control of expenditure lies in the re-establish-ment of collective responsibility, which the abolition of Cabinet Government during the war seems to have entirely destroyed. The newspapers continue to carry on a campaign against waste. They have unearthed a new example at i Poole Harbour, where against exj pert advice £225,000 was expended in 1918 in order to provide an alter- { native port for dross-Channel traffic. Subsequently it was discovered that I ■ shipping was unable to cross the j bar of the harbour during gales, and J the work was abandoned. It is also ! pointed out that scores of good ' engines arid hundreds of waggons are I standing idle in the Leeds depot. A I vast quantity of army air force ] stores are rusting in a derelict depot ' at Didcot, which covers eight square ; miles. Thousands of ambulances, ■ waggons, water carts, gun carriages and limbers are standing there axle deep in mud. Millions of wash leather gloves, tied in bundles, are used as footballs.