THE DAILY TIMES IN REPLY.

Otago Witness, Issue 1945, 4 June 1891, Page 18

THE DAILY TIMES IN REPLY.

The Hon. John M'Kenzie has made his reply to the allegations of Mr Spence and the strictures of the press on the subject, and on other administrative acts of his during the short period he has been in office. That reply, however plausible it may seem to the superficial reader, we have no hesitation in pronouncing distinctly incomplete and unsatisfactory. Mr M'Kenzie deals with a number of subjects that are not of special interest at the present moment, or which at any rate are not relevant to the charges recently brought up against him, and with these there is no necessity for us to deal. We shall confine our attention to the administration of the department under his charge, which includes the appointments of Mr Ritchie and of Mr Duncan Campbell, as well as his dealings with the Wellington Land Board and other bodies charged with the duty of assisting him in the administration of the public lands. First, then, as to the appointment of Mr Ritchie. Mr M'Kenzie declares that he found the Stock department so disorganised that a chief^nspector was necessary, and "on going through the lists of the department he did not find one in whom he could place sufficient confidence to appoint to the office." Now the first thing to notice in connection with this most sweeping condemnation of /an entire department is that it was made by a man who had himself been but a couple of months in office, and who could not possibly be in a position to say with any degree of certainty or justice whether the various officers were or were not equal to the position of chief inspector. There were on Mr M'Kenzie's own showing six chief inspectors in the service, all of them men who had been trained to their work, and . against whom he has nothing whatever to say. Would it not have been the barest act of justice to give one of them at least a trial before he went to an outsider who, while possessing no more practical experience than many of the inspectors, had no official training whatever? But let us assume that; Mr M'Kenzie was justified in his condemnation of the entire department. "He then," he says, " looked outside the department for an able man, and thought of Mr Ritchie."But how far afield did Mr M'Kenzie " look" for a man to fill what he himself terms a most important position ? His survey extended no further than his next door neighbour, — to a friend, a constituent, and, as is pretty well known, a political supporter of his own ! Was Mr M'Kenzie not bound, in common justice to the department he ignored, to lpok outside the ranks of his own friends, and see if the rest of the colony could provide a man whose qualifications might be even greater than Mr Ritchie's? Mr Ritchie was selected because he was an "energetic, steady, and economical station manager." Are we to suppose there are no other steady, economical . and energetic station managers 'in the colony, and indeed in the department itself? Or does it follow that because a man is a good station manager that therefore he is competent to administer a whole department of the public service to the total exclusion of those who have been already trained to the work? And this steady station manager must have a thre.e years' engagement because he would not otherwise have accepted the post. Surely then was the time for Mr M'Kenzie to go outside his own neighbourhood, and see if any one else could be got who was equally steady and energetic, and less exactiug ; It seems to us that a good deal more must be known about this appointment before the public can be got to believe that Mr M'Kenzie was studying the public service, and not the interests of his personal friends. But except in so far as the appoint* ment of Mr Ritchie is likely to

demoralise and dishearten the Stock department, it is in itself a comparatively small matter. If it stood alone and pointed to nothing worse of the same kind little notice might be taken of it. But in the Spence business it paves, the way . for something not so easy of palliation or defence, and the most serious aspect of which Mr M'Kenzie has not even touched. The reasons alleged by Mr M'Kenzie for the removal of Mr Spence are surely such as were never before made the excuse for so serious a step to an officer of his experience and, standing in the service. Mr M'Kenzie says that he had had complaints sent to him as to the administration of lands and forests in Southland, but he says nothing of the fact that his informant was no other than the man. Campbell himself. Then he talks vaguely of serious complaints that were made against Mr Spence, but not a word as to the nature of the complaints, which we are asked to take purely on trust. As a specimen of wrongdoing on Mr Spence's part, Mr M'Kenzie had handed to him a newspaper containing an advertisement for which Mr Spence could not be held responsible until his attention was drawn to it. Then there is a gentleman in Invercargill whom we are vaguely told could " obtain anything he asked for at the hands of the Southland Land Board." This same gentleman held a certain considerable area of land for sawmilling purposes, though there is not a word to show that the law had been trespassed in granting it. Not one word either about the Pine Oompa'ny, of which Sir It. Stout is chairman, which has a larger extent of land and is infinitely a much greater monopolist — although we do not say* that any sound objection can be urged against the grants to that company. Lastly, a piece of timber land in Southland, "value L 3 per acre, had been sold for 12s 6d cash" — . one of those vague charges that fifty times over have been brought against every land board in the colony. Let us assume that all these trivialities warranted the removal and practical degradation of an old public servant. The fact would be nothing but for the extraordinary selection made by . Mr M'Kenzie of an officer to safeguard the interests of the public. Of this individual — Mr Duncan Campbell —Mr 'M'Kenzie professes to know nothing, except the official fact that he, had once been ranger in Southland. This does not accord with what we have good reason to believe is the fact ; that Mr M'Kenzie has been in the habit of taking up his abode in Mr Campbell's house on the occasions — except the last-^-of his visits to Invercargill. But that may be allowed to pass. The main point, and the one to which Mr M'Kenzie has studiously avoided all reference, is : Did he consider his friend Mr Campbell, in the light of a certain action brought against him in the Supreme Court, a proper person to fill the appointment under the Southland Land Board? Mr M'Kenzie professes to have a great concern for the .progress of small settlement. Does ha think that the interests of small settlers would be safe in the hands of a man who would make the attempt that Mr Campbell did to get possession of the land of a couple of orphan children in the Industrial School 1 We have already said that this most serious aspect of the case has not been' touched by Mr M'Kenzie ; nor can his defence be held to have one particle of validity unless he can completely clear himself with respect to this matter. If his object is to purify the public service and safeguard the interest of settlers, he has certainly hit upon a remarkable way of doing so. It is quite true that Mr Campbell can show a meagre and guarded testimonial from Mr Spence himself, and Mr Spence's case is greatly weakened by the fact. But the practice of loosely giving such testimonials to men who are leaving a service and have their way to make in another is too common to carry with it any significance whatever. We have not space to deal with Mr M'Kenzie's relations with the Wellington Land Board. He wrote that body, which is made up of his own official subordinates, a most insulting letter, implying that they had been systematically favouring dummyism. Amidst all that he has now to say about the Board there is not a solitary word about dummyism — nothing more, in fact, than that, like every other Board in the colony, it had been slow to evict settlers for non-fulfilment of conditions.' Mr M'Kenzie adopted the same attitude to the Otago Education Board when he told them that he

should advise the Minister of Education for the future to treat their representations with contempt, or something like it. Can it be that all the adminministrative boards of the colony, and most of its public officers, are corrupt or effete, and that purity and energy are only to be found in Mr Duncan Campbell and Mr M'Kenzie's cronies generally ? Mr M'Kenzie complains of the attacks of what he calls the Conservative press, ignoring the fact that the most severe of all his critics has been the Wellington Evening Post, hitherto the most pronounced Ministerial paper in the colony. Mr M'Kenzie's inclusion in the Cabinet was received by the whole press of the colony with every sign of satisfaction, and his own qualities of shrewdness and good sense cordially recognised. If that note has been changed for one of condemnation he has himself alone to thank for it.