MR FERGUS AT QUEENSTOWN.

Otago Witness, Issue 1865, 19 August 1887, Page 16

MR FERGUS AT QUEENSTOWN.

Mr T. Fergus, M.H.B. for Wakatipu, addressed a meeting of the electors of Queenstown in the new Volunteer Hall on Monday evening last. Mr James Reid, mayor of the borough, occupied the chair. We make the following extracts from the Daily Times' report of the speech :—

■RETRENCHMENT he had never been an advocate of the indiscriminate cutting down of salaries, and he believed in paying the Government officials according to their ability, just as if they were employed by private firms. The Government, however, should see that they got full value for their money, and that no useless officers or departments were in existence. — (Applause.) The amount that could be saved through retrenchment in the civil service was not so great as people imagined, but there was little doubt that many of the departments were too large. The constituencies were all clamouring for retrenchment; but it was the blood of their brethren, not their own, that they wanted to shed. The Government, however, instead of being more economical, were getting more prodigal year by year. . They had even created new departments, and last year £10,365 had been spent on forestry. Of this £4005 went for paying salaries, £1610 for the establishment of a school of forestry at Whangarei, and £1425 for travelling expenses. Then there was

THE MINES DEPARTMENT. Sir Julius Vogel had called in a gentleman to act as Minister of that department, but the man. whom he had called had, so far as he (Mr Fergus) could learn, no special aptitude for the post. The total sum voted last year in connection with this department was £32,693. Of that sum £4726 was paid in salaries, £10,381 for the maintenance of four water races on the West Coast, £3000 for compensation to a gentleman who owned a coal pit at Shag Point, £1511 to the sufferers by the Tarawera disaster, and £3714 for the Geological and Meteorological departments (though what the latter had to do with the Mines department he did not know). The salaries amounted to 12J per cent, of the sum voted, and taking into consideration the Ministers' expenses for travelling, together with house allowance and the expense of a private secretary, it would be found that 22§ per cent, of the total amount voted had been spent for those objects. All he had to say was that the game was not worth the candle. Unless they received more satisfactory benefits, the sooner they swept the whole thing away the better. The surest way to develop the mining resources would be by abolishing obnoxious restrictions, simplifying the mining laws, and by following up the miner with decent roads and tracks, so as to make his claim accessible. In doing that they would be doing a good thing and removing the reproach that attached to the goldfields and their representatives at the present time. In the matter of retrenchment, a good deal might be done in regard to the Mines department— in fact they might almost abolish the Minister of Mines altogether. Coming to

THE EDUCATION QUESTION he recognised that he was on ticklish ground. He would not be in favour of doing anything that would impair the efficiency of our present system. At the same time there was no doubt that the education vote might be considerably reduced. In the first place there were far too many boards in the coleny. A good deal might be saved by abolishing some of them; in fact they might almost be swept away altogether if the committees were given increased powers. He would also favour a reduction in the number of inspectors, and he thought they should be peripatetic and under the control of the Inspector-general in Wellington. Then in towns a saving could be effected by raising the school age ; though it would not do to put this plan into force in the country, because it would be the means of closing up numbers of the smaller schools altogether. This he would strenuously oppose, for he recognised that the men who went into the country to till the land or into the back gullies of the mountain passes to extract the gold had a right to demand education for their children, and the State had no right to deprive them of it. — (Applause.) Another point was that in thus providing free education the young men would be induced to marry, and a man was much the better of having a family and the comforts of a home ; he spoke from some little experience.— (Laughter and applause.) By raising the 6chool age in the cities they might effect a saving of about £30,000. He did not believe in denominationalism,"nor did he believe in the Bible in schools. — (Applause.) Denominationalism would largely increase the cost of education throughout the country, while the introduction of the Bible into the public schools would do a grievous injustice to a very large section of the community. If the Bible were introduced they would find him fighting for denominationalism, as that then would be the only fair way to grant justice to those whose consciences might be offended by its introduction.— (Applause.) The question of

PUBLIC WORKS EXPENDITURE was a serious one. There was at present lying idle in uncompleted works £1,250,000. A great deal of this money had been idle for years, the formations were going to the bad, and the timbers of the bridges were rotting. Now, these works would have to be completed to something like a paying point. The Premier in Dunedin had told his audience that £2,000,000 would be quite sufficient to make all the railways required in New Zealand for the next 20 years. The Premier, however, had left out of his calculation the main line through the North Island, which would cost £1,293,000 ; so that it would, according to official estimates, take £3,400,000 to complete the lines to anything like a paying point. In 1884 he (Mr Fergus) had estimated the cost of completing the lines then being prosecuted at £10,000,000. Since then about £3,000,000 had been borrowed, and they had given between £3,000,000 and £4,000,000 in land for the East and West Coast and Napier lines ; so that if it now required something like £3,000,000 or £4,000,000 to complete those lines still in hand, it would be seen that his estimate at that time had not been too much. In order to complete the lines now in hand to a paying point it would be necessary to go in for a moderate amount of borrowing. He had supported Mr Pyke's bill to have the Ofcago Central constructed on the land-grant system. He had been twitted with this because he had opposed the West Coast line, but he justified himself by showing that the circumstances were altogether different. A great deal of auriferous country had been given away with the West Coast line, but such a thing was not proposed with reference to the Otago Central, and one of the provisions was that the land should be sold in areas of 320 acres under the conditions of the Land Board of Otago. In connection with

LAND ADMINISTRATION the colony had not been doing very well. There was a cry, especially in the cities, amongst political demagogues— men who never owned an

acre of land in their lives — about the nationalisation of the land. The cry, however, was an impossible one ; for, however willing, they would be unable to nationalise the land. He proceeded to adversely criticise Mr Ballance's Land Acquisition Bill, introduced last session, and also his action in going so far beyond the vote granted by the House for the village settlement scheme. The system of village settlement had always been a failure, and it was not likely to succeed now. The result would be misery and ruin to these people in the long run.

In answer to questions, Mr Fergus said he would be in favour of reducing the salary of future Governors to £5000. He was not in favour of reducing the number of Ministers to four. That number could not possibly get through the work properly. By reducing the number of Ministers other officials would have to be created. The salaries of Ministers might be reduced, but he did not think £200 was too much for members of the House of Representatives. He had never been able to keep his expenses within that sum. The town members did not have to spend so much as members of a large electorate like Wakatipu. In these times, however, the members for the interior should be willing to submit to a little sacrifice, and until times got better he would be in favour of a reduction of the honorarium to £150. He would only favour borrowing to a small extent for necessary works. He believed in the enlargement of the counties. He would support an alteration in the constitution of land boards. The appointments lately had not found favour with the country, and the. expenses were far too heavy. He thought the gold duty should be abolished.

Dr Douglas proposed a vote of thanks and confidence, which was seconded by Mr F. Evans, of Skippers, and carried unanimously amid a good deal of enthusiasm.