TOO MUCH COMMITTEE WORK.

Southland Times, Issue 19461, 28 January 1925, Page 6

TOO MUCH COMMITTEE WORK.

When Abraham Lincoln enunciated the famous dictum of “Government of the people by the people, for the people,” he laid down an historical principle the soundness of which is as unassailable to-day as when it was originally delivered. It is, indeed, the keynote of our democratic form of government. Yet, in devious ways, there are efforts here in New Zealand to thwart the application of this essential condition to the conduct of good government. We refer to the ever-increasing penchant of local bodies, particularly here in Southland, to transact the people’s business in camera. Yesterday, the Southland Education Board followed its usual procedure of dealing with important matters in committee despite a protest by Mr Jones. The other week the Southland Power Board sat all day in committee, with the doors banged, bolted and barred to the Press and public, considering

a. most important report for which the people in the end will have to pay. Other bodies are offenders to a greater or lesser degree, adopting a procedure that is foreign to the true principles of democracy and possessing all the evil features necessary for its wholesale condemnation. Indeed, there is nothing whatever to commend this policy of secrecy. On the contrary, it breeds in the public mind a suspicion, which may be absolutely unsupported by fact, that all is not well, that things are not as they should be. Suspicion is a dangerous and insidious condition to be allowed to exist, yet the manner in which star chamber methods are being adopted and encouraged by a number of local bodies suggests that it is nurtured in a most undesirable manner. We unhesitatingly affirm that persistence in such a policy will yet re-act as a boomerang, and that its continuance will cause the people not to further trust those who will not trust the people with their own business.