STATE INTERFERENCE

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 17231, 10 April 1930, Page 12

STATE INTERFERENCE

IN MANY DIRECTIONS

MATTER Or NATIONAL CONCERN

Al ;i gathering of memheis rif I lie New Zealand Denial Associal ion held m Auckland recently. allusions were made lo tin 1 glutting foiuliMit-N of llio Government, through ih> various departments, lo obtrude upon 11 in spheres of profiissional men. l)o furs, dentists, lUv yers, architects and others, it was said, were, fared with opposition from the. State \vfiit'li was justified neither by the needs of the public nor by the short coniines of the professions. The doctors and dentists had no objection to the Stale watching as closely as it pleased 1 the medical and dental needs of children in the public m Tools or of children and adafts'in other public institutions of the kind. They did not mind doing a great deal of gratuitous work themselves - that was the lot of their professions—but they did protest, against, the State taking out of I heir hands practice for which hey had ijiuilitieil by long years o! study and labor, and handing it over to officials, who might or might, no! ho as well qualified, ami who. in any case, would he a charge upon the taxpayer.

OTiIEII- EXAMPLES

About tin; same time as the doctors ami dentists were making their protests in Auckland the fruitgrowers in the Nelson district were laying their grievances • against an ineffective system of "control Indore the .Minister of Agriculture. Mr. .McKee, their spokesman, told the I lon. (,'. V\. Embus that the handling of the growers’ fruit in Wellington last year laid cost lire growers £60.800 as a result, of delay "for which control m Wellington was responsible.” the growers, it seems, did not suggest (he abolition of control, but they wanted a strong, capable organisation Unit would he really representative of their interesls. lime is another protest against Government interferaiieo with private enterprise even when the intrusion is wrapped Up in the guise of industrial co-operation. Other examples of tho results of State meddling with private enterprise may lie gathered from the j Railway statement for the last financial I year. Ihe Wakatipu steamers showed , a loss of £6484 i the departmental dwell-1 iogs a loss of £165,176: flic road motor] service a loss of £5879, and tho railway sawmills and bush a toss of £22.057-~a l olal of k 98,596, against which refresh numt rooms, bookstalls, advertising and some odds and ends returned only £21,226, leaving a net- loss of 1777.370. j It remtiihs for the Government, what-!

ever its til It* or its color may he. to See • that the railways of the I loin i n ion are I placed upon a sound 'business basis, and j that all their subsidiary undertakings are justified by results or promptly j scrapped. There is no sound reason why ■ the taxpayers should ho maintaining ! .steamers to carry holiday makers to . tourisi resorts, or why they should he I providing the menus for running Stale sawmills at a loss. These are items be- ] longing to a class of subjects which ' rarely receive the attention they should | from Parliament, and ofi that aero tint | should have the closest scrutiny from the Government of the day. ‘■THE NEW DESPOTISM.” I aider this heading Lord flewart. the Lord Chief .Justice of England, has lately published a hook in which lie points out (hat public departments at floiiit* have assumed the powers of Parliament and the duties of the Law Courts. '‘They have,” it is put bluntly by the distinguished'aminieiitator, ‘Taken power (o tmake regulations which have I lie force of statutes and to oust the jurisdiction of the judges at their plea- [ sure ” This sweeping statement has a direct hearing upon the various matters just indicated here. The Hoard of Trade Act, still on the New Zealand Statute Hook, gives the departments here even greater mandatory authority than do the regulations in tho Mother Country mentioned by the Lord Chief .lustice. And yet an apathetic public in the Dominion is content to leave the Beard of Trade Act on the Statute Book to lie pul into operation by any Government that wishes to gel its own way without the authority of either Parliament or people. In New Zealand the judges and the other side ate, given no standing at all. The do- I partmenl is supremo. - Contributed by the Assir'iaied (,‘ha in hers of Commerce,' through the Gisborne chamber. i