THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. THURSDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1922. THE ISSUES TO-DAY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18267, 7 December 1922, Page 8

THE New Zealand Herald. AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. THURSDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1922. THE ISSUES TO-DAY.

The appeal to the electors of New Zealand has reached its climax. Each case presented has been discussed exhaustively from all aspects. The issue is in the hands of the voter. His verdict is to be delivered today, and being delivered, must be accepted. It cannot be too strongly' emphasised that it is the duty of all citizens enjoying the franchise to exercise it. To do so is at once a privilege and a solemn obligation. The apathy which causes abstention i is the worst enemy democracy has jto fear. The duty is not an onerous i one : even if it were, it would still i be binding. The citizen who refrains from voting disfranchises himself, ! threatens the foundations of Parlia- ' mentary government, and robs himself of any right to criticise the outcome. To cast a vote and to abide by the results of the poll are the two things chiefly reqidred of the elector if the present system is to continue. To vote, then, is the first duty. Tbe next requirement is that it should be done thoughtfully, and with a due appreciation of the issues facing the elector. A multiplicity of views has been placed before the public in the past few weeks. By every utiiisable means the claims of leaders, parties, and individuals have been noised abroad. The mass of detail is, at first sight, complex and bewildering. On examination there are easily to be discerned certain broad lines of difference by which the way may be made clear toward choosing between candidates. Three parties appeal for support, and in the main the elector must give his verdict in favour of one out of these three.

Whatever the personality or the claims of Labour candidates, their desirability or otherwise must be weighed by the unescapable fact that they all stand committed to a programme involving basic alterations to the present structure of society. Even in the best of times responsible citizens should realise what it would mean to overturn the present order, so that there might be substituted a system of wholesale socialisation and nationnlisa- \ tion, which its most enthusiastic: advocates cannot claim to be working : successfully anywhere in the world. To convince thinking men and women that it Mould be likely to succeed now or at any time is a task still unperformed. Another alternative is the party led by Mr. Wilford, alongside which stand a number of independent candidates whose most definite declaration is that they will not accept Mr. Wilford as leader. The most determined opponents of the Government show the essential weakness of the present shadowy successors of the old Liberal Party by the manner in which they conduct their case. When they are tired of purely destructive criticism, they have no resource save to talk abstract Liberalism. That may or may not be a very good creed. Much depends on the men who interpret it and offer to give it effect. The impossibility of depicting Mr. Wilford doing so is shown by the care with which his friends have abstained from the task. Their whole cry is that the Government should be turned out. Whom do they offer as a substitute'? The Labour Party? Thev hardly dare go that far. Mr. Wilford and the heterogeneous collection of his followers, the lukewarm friends who may vote with him if there is no clanger of Labour slipping in, and the independents wdio hardly know what they will do except that they will not accept Mr. Wilford? The idea is grotesque. The party to which this abstract Liberalism must be applied, if it is to be taken seriously as an alternative to the policy of the present

Government, is principally characterised by internal jealousies, petty disputes, and general lack of unity. In opposition it has been spiritless and singularly ineffective. It would be unthinkable in power. Mr. Wilford in his election message—or is it his farewell message ?—confidently predicts that his party will come back "with an addition to its,ranks of men of experience, judgment, and wide knowledge." He must be making some mistake. He cannot bring out any new candidates. The nominations have closed. A survey of those offering, taking the Auckland Province as typical, does not show whence they are to come.

With these characteristics in the Opposition, it follows that the antiGovernment crusade ends iu carping criticism, and cannot offer an acceptable alternative. "New problems arise and new ideas arc blown round the world," it is said with a good deal of truth. Mr. Wilford, however, says " back to Seddon," back to the days when the new problems did not exist and the new ideas had not been b'orn. If any formula then existing could be applied to them, 'Mr. Wilford might be fully trusted not to find it. If it were shown him, he would undoubtedly bungle tho application of it. Desperation has led to some peculiar things being said in the effort to damage the Government. For instance, it is alleged that its legislation has a bias against, the wage-earner. Coincidently it is pointed out that since 1018 the Civil servants have increased in number from 15.69S to 17.564, and the bill for their salaries from £2.315,000 to £4,328,000. With the numbers increased by 2000. the aggregate of salaries has gone up by £2.000,000, on figures quoted in hostility. It seems a very generous employer which is accused of a bias against the employed generally. It is not necessary, however, to multiply instances. The case against the Government is founded largely on inconsistencies, and at its best is incomplete as evidence for a change. The country, if it values: stable administration, if it desires something better than visionaries on the one hand, or men who cannot avoid failing into a constant succession of pits of their own digging, on the other hand, has only one choice. The Government has its faults and has made mistakes. Nobody denies that. It need not reach perfection, however, to be easily the best offering in New Zealand politics to-day. By returning it. the elector will give tli* Dominion the best prospect of orderly and ordered government, under which it: may continue its progress from depression into renewed prosperity, undisturbed by the dubious experiments of one paity or the general want of purpose, decision, and vision which is all that could be offered by the other claimants to the position held by Mr. Massey and his; colleagues. These are the alternatives offered the elector, who should weigh them carefully before making his choice in the exercise of his highest privilege as a citizen.

REFORM ADMINISTRATION. The outstanding feature of the Liberal Party's campaign has been that both criticism of the. Government and exposition of the Liberal policy have been expressed in vague generalisations. To-day the electors are no wiser than they were six weeks ago as to how the party would run a State bank, how it would increase public works construction and simultaneously curtail borrowing, how it would reduce taxation and at the same time make concessions and expand public services. On the other hand, the party has condemned the Government's record with sweeping generalisations that will not bear examination. Thus it has been declared that "to better the administrative record of the present Government would not be difficult." No one would suggest' that the administration of the national affairs is perfect, but the implication that a Liberal Ministry would effect greater or more rapid' improvement than the present Government is absurd. Mr. Massey and his party did not construct the present system. For 21 years the Liberal Party had continuous control of the administration, and when they were expelled from office there was such a condition of confusion and inefficiency as no Ministry could | be expected to completely j in five years, even if it had been able \ to devote its attention wholly to the | task. The management of public | works, the great spending departj ment, is typical. For twenty years j the Liberal Party laid railways and i built roads on foundations of polifci- ! cal patronage ; it began new lines | without any definite idea where they ; would end, without any inquiry j whether they were actually necessary, indeed without looking furI ther ahead than the next election. | Throughout the whole of that period I the Liberal administration of public works never rose beyond the degree of efficiency of which the symbols are the pick and shovel and the wheelbarrow. All that has been altered within the last three years. Under the stimulating control of Mr. Coatea, the department has been reorganised internally; its methods have been revolutionised ; and its outlook has been extended to embrace both definite objectives and a full sense of its responsibility. Mr. Coates has a simple policy—the concentration of all his resources on the | most urgent works, the employment j of the most efficient methods and | machinery; and the completion of ■ every undertaking as rapidly as possible so that capital costs will be restricted and earning power yielded with the least delay. So far as public works are concerned, " Back to Seddon " means a reversion to political patronage and the wheeli barrow. The Repatriation Depart- | ment may be. cited as a branch of administration wholly created by the present Government. In three years this department has obtained employment for 28,000 men, and given

assistance in other ways to 34,000 men, and its whole record is a challenge to the criticism of the Government's administrative ability. Important changes have been made in the education service, the administration of public health measures has been vastly improved, substantial progress has been made toward the utilisation of idle -native land. These are merely typical of the administrative record of the present Government. Its purpose throughout the public services has been to replace .carelessness by efficiency, to apply the practical tests of commercial principles instead of the routine methods of departmental regulations, to make State trading enterprises independent of subsidies from taxation, and to count the cost of social services. Much remains to be done before the machinery of administration will run smoothly and efficiently, but judging from the past history of the Liberal Party—the test upon which Mr. Wilford himself relies —it is doubtful whether a Liberal Government would attempt to complete the task of regeneration and still more doubtful whether it would succeed.