The Oamaru Mail WEDNESDAY, MARCH 10, 1880.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1216, 10 March 1880, Page 2

The Oamaru Mail WEDNESDAY, MARCH 10, 1880.

On* Thursday last a deputation waited upon the Government at Wellington for the purpose of urging upon them the necessity for proceeding with the Wellington and Foxton railway. There is nothing singular in this circumstance, for deputations are continually waiting upon Ministers to urge the necessity for something or other being done, and we should not have devoted any attention to the matter had it not been for the very interesting statement made by the Hon.! Mr. Oliver in reply. After a little preliminary sparring, the Minister hit straight out from the shoulder, and floored the deputation with a few remarks that may well set the Colony thinking. "There was one difficulty in the way of getting on with these works," said the Minister for Public Works, as reported in the Post, "and that was the want of funds." He followed this up with the assurance that "unless the greatest economy were used in the expenditure of money the Colony would soon be in a condition of great financial embarrassment." Then followed a reference to the Royal Commission upon railways, which is highly instructive as showing the work the Commissioners will hare to perform, and the straits in which the Cotonyhas been landed by the authorisation of railway lines having no other claim to consideration than the securing of votes. The remarks of the Minister are therefore worthy of reproduction and careful consideration. He said:— "With the view of getting over the difficulty which stared them in the face, the Government last session obtained the appointment of a Royal Commission to enquire into the railway system, and to ascertain which of the lines authorised bv Parliament should be proceeded with first. The Government hoped that the Commission would be at work within a week, and it was for the Commissioners to say which works should l>e proceeded with, and which should be discontinued,'' At last then wc have arrived at the turning point. We have found that we eannpt go further on the road to ruin without precipitating the solemn fate towards which we have been travel ling. Session after session the Governments for the time being—we make no distinctions—have placed sums upon the estimates for the construction of railways for no other reason than that if they did not do so certain "honorable members" would cross over to the other side, and find places in the ranks of the Opposition. How many thousands of pounds, we should like to know, have been voted away for no other purpose than to please friends, and secure for the Ministry a further lease of power? We fear the Hum would be one of astonishing magnitude if all the items could be adefed up. We do not alone blame Ministers, juist and present, for tliis unprincipled proceeding; Parliament as a whole has been equally culpable in re"ard to the prodigality that has characterised the administration of the Colony's affairs during the past nine years." The representatives of the Colony, instead of jealously watching the expenditure of the borrowed millions, and carefully considering whether or not the proposed works would prove reproductive in the true sense of the term, have joined freely in unseemly scrambles for a share of the loaves and fishes. Everj' member has had his "little railway "line" to propose, and has used every available device to obtain for it consideration. To this fact; we owe the hundreds of miles of rail-1 way in the Colony that do not return sufficient —or, at best, more than sufficient to cover working expenses. It is useless now to consider who is primarily to blame for this state of things j but we cannot refrain from saying that the parent of the Public Works Policy is as much to bjame as, if not more to blame than, any other man. In his original proposals there was a very salutary clause providing for the levying of a special tax upon any districtthroughwhich a railway wasconstructed and was afterwards found not to give an adequate return to the Colonial exchequer. That clause of the Public Works Act was dictated bv wisdom ! and a knowledge of the recklessness of Colonial Parliaments when dealing with borrowed money, and should h'ave been adhered to at all hazards. It was the one great safeguard against the construction of unremunerative railways. But the House of Representatives, in its grad'ness, could not brook any barrier being raised agninat the construction of any line, even though there was no prospect of it paying within the present century; and in a moment of weakness, Sir Julius Vogei permitted the saving clause of his scheme to be ruthlessly repealed. From the moment that this revocation of one of the cardinal principles of the Public Works Policy was agreed to —from the moment that tins safety-valve was removed—may be dated the commencement of the .immoral outcry for the expenditure of ptfblic money, the notorious bidding for uunport which charadmseu' the career

of the " continuous Ministry;," and the commencement of a period .of financial trouble. At last there, seems to be a. desire to check this thoughtless and ruinous prodigality by relegating Governmental powers to Commissions:. It is a pity that repentance and a desire for reform have come so late in the day. But "better late than never," and if Parliament, when dealing with railways, will only, from this time henceforth, place itself in the position of Directors of a company striving to invest the capital entrusted to them with no other object than that of obtaining the greatest amount of profit, we shall soon feel the salutary effects of such a wise and radical change of policy. The past cannot be recalled. We shall have to make the best of the completed railways that do not pay, the numerous half-constructed lines for the completion of which we have not the money, a load of debt, and taxation unparalleled in any other civilised land. Truly, the picture is a dismal one, and if true of any less favored land than New Zea-' land, would be a sure index of the near approach of utter bankruptcy.