RAILWAY MANAGEMENT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19931, 27 April 1928, Page 10

RAILWAY MANAGEMENT.

The Minister of Railways has taken a step that must draw attention again, and draw it sharply, to a subject of national interest, management of the State railways. He is recalling to the service Mr. H. H. Sterling, formerly an official and a member of the board, who resigned

some time ago to accept an important position in private employment. Mr. Coates has gone further, by appealing most strongly to the company which had engaged Mr. Sterling to release him as indispensable to the department. It is a high compliment to Mr. Sterling. To the public it suggests certain questions. If the Minister is thus bent on strengthening the personnel of the management, is he also determined that the results of working the system must be improved at all costs 1 Not long ago he admitted that the railways were still losing money at the rate of £1,000,000 a year. Does the pronounced attempt to reinforce the managerial strength—for the terms on which Mr. Sterling's release has been asked show how Mr. Coates regards the move—also foreshadow an intensive drive to make the railways pay, or at least to reduce the enormous drain they now are upon the public revenue 1 ? Some three years ago the constitution of a board of management was offered to the country as an innovation which would promote efficiency of working and produce results more satisfactory to the taxpayer than those which had signalised the years immediately preceding. It is obvious that management by a board, in itself, has not achieved what was hoped of it. The point of immediate moment is whether, leaving out of account altogether the personality of those who serve at the head of the department, there is to be a concentration of effort to make the railways pay. The public would appreciate prompt information about this, and some light on what new developments it may expect.