CORRESPONDENCE.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume VII, Issue 1073, 20 July 1880, Page 2

CORRESPONDENCE.

'■• ■._■ - .■ » _ '. ■ • We do not hold ourselves responsible for opinions ■•"■■■ ■ • expressed by correspondents.] RETRENCHMENT. ; [To the Editor of the. Herall).] Sir,— Amidst all the clamour [for retrenchment, the danger of running into the opposite extremeshould not be lost si-iht; for we may find a Scylla for our Charybdis. Experience shows that unless the whole .Government staff of a country -are well ; paid ; that Government soon sinks, into corruption. A contingency we would do well to bear in mind before cutting short,' through false economy, ..all salaries, . grants, endowments, etc." Taken collectively the.'jsiilaries paid ; by/, .the. ; cplony are enormous ; taken individually, I doubt' whether, any , colony . pays less. : -$he salary is larger , than usually given. 4)y merchants to their 'clerks, we cannot* expect men of ability to enter the service of the State— blockheads we do not want. - What >we have Jo regret and is the' multiplication * : of the offipes. and. officers far ...beyond |]the. requirements of any jcolony under tEet sun. We havei two'; departmgmss. incorporated with the .Government, which cost far more than all the rest put "slogether — tKe'Native Office akin to that of old, ycleptfthrercireurploqutioin]; and that which has the 'distinguished of having Sir Julius "Yogel at its . head. . With tlie" first, can one 'single .instancebe broiiglit. forward ,in which, it h£s contributed to the' .prosperity', of the country. , ,tjgly and misshapen as : . the tram [which gav6 ' it" birth> like the dragon oFbld^ " its shiny length pollutes the verdant plain." Twin-brother' of it, if not identical, is the L.P.D., which " smells to heaven;" A great deal of land has passed through these two, and infinitely greater amount of cash has been melted by these, clever alchemists, more clever than the ancients, who merely sought to make gold out of baser materials, thes>e moderns have made out of gold — nothing — chiefly. More money has been spent than the whole colony, population, themselves included and all, would fetch if put up " tv auction. Another mistake is; the mode of dealing with the Natives re land sales. Instead of dealing directly with the Government, all transactions are drawn out to an interminable length by the aforesaid circumlocutionary process. The Government should also recognise all sales whether the consideration has. been money or goods. At present the Natives have a premium offered to them for dishonesty, and are encouraged to repudiate all dealing if they have a shadow of a chance. Hence- arises the confusion of titles, under which we labour. The Maori of to-day is no longer " childlike and bland." He can take care of himself if need were ; but. j as long as the Government will do so for him, he is quite content. Once let. him see that pretended ignorance of its value will not avail as a plea for repudiating transactions in which he was a free agent, very speedily titlular troubles will be at an end. They will take care to obtain a fair value for their own shares. ' Only those who know him not, believe in his simplicity. I did once, but a very long, time ago. . If the. Government : recbgtiise. his .'right to' sell his land as he pleases,' he'll- take .care of the rest, ■ and all the machinery. pfT L.P.D. ,wiU be^cleared away a nor .block up and' Kinder the development -of the Ooloriyi -'■ -■ '■■' }■■ •'■ '*'•■■ ! . ' ; •-'.: /. /'. •.'.,.! "i Next, the Agent-Generalship. Sir J ulius Yogel is a clever man, and most have ,'heafd ;thait \be didva" grd,atf j deal^f <jr . the colony. He di^, borrowed and spent (money with ja marvellous f aoility, and when 5 ' we were approidliing : : insolvency, he kindly .withdrew 1 from 'the. scene 'of his' glory, 1 considerately accepting the post of Agent-General) hot for the sake' of the honorarium, or,- in plain. English, the wages . of £4000 a. year, but simply io be of Tide of his' dear country ; : and were he has since 'distinguished "himself by treating the wishes of the colonists (unless indeed a loan with' '2^ per cenfcom'miHsioh'a.ttach'e'd to it had to be raised, wheii he'shbwed great alacrity iii' 1 raising the; '^aid lpah)' with cool contempt. He to paid -for, his services at 'a rate which' ought, to have cleared off all liability, "past, present, and future,- and '. should be dismissed. These departments'; might well be spared, and a great consequent saving effected. We carinofi expect, however, to save in one year, what has taken us seven to squander. Neither by initiating a second Black Wednesday shall we raise ourselves in the estimation of the wise. Also let us avoid giving birth to sinecures for the benefit of veterans -who have not grown hoary in our service. We are too young to have such appendages ; when we do we will pay for them. Of officers let us have as few as possible, as good aa possible*. Now, imagine that if we top it and the Tree of State will grow as fresh as ever. We must thin the branches ; indiscriminate pruning will blight the stock. — I am, &c, Tai Rawhiti.