POLITICAL.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVII, Issue 21, 25 September 1913, Page 5

POLITICAL.

THE REFORM GOVERNMENT AND ITS CRITICS. [To The Editor Stratford Post.] Sir,—Had your correspondent, C. D. Sole, troubled to make a few ordinary enquiries before rushing into print, he would hardly have made the serious mistakes into which his letter ol the loth inst. shows he has fallen, t nder the heading of “More Reform,” he undertook to instruct your readers upon the doings of the Reform Ministry, so far as the Advances to Settiers Office is concerned, with results mat must he disastrous to his reputation for veracity, when the facts are disclosed. A Taranaki friend,

who has drawn my attention to Mr Sole’s letter, asks me to reply to it, and, witii your kind permission, I propose to do so. Mr Sole, in his opening sentence, says in effect that tli Advances Office is turning down all applications for loans “made by farmers, small settlers and others, ’ who would like to take advantage of its operations. That statement is wholly contrary to fact. The policy of the Advances Board, which is administered on non-political lines, is to decline no application where the security offered is at all acceptable and reasonably good, and if a return were called for, it would be found that only a very small percentage of the applications that come before the Board are declined, and that, where they are so declined, it is simply because the curity offered is doubtful. That is an easily ascertainable fact. In the next place, Mr Sole asserts that, “out of all the millions that ‘Reform’ (why the sneer?) has borrowed, and are going to borrow this year, no provision is made for the Advances Office.” That again is a distinctly untruthful statement. Of the three million Joan of this year, three quarters of a million was provided for the Advances Offices, and other moneys are being obtained for the same office. Then Mr Solo repeats the absurd statement that “the Massey Government borrowed £200,000 of the settlers’ money for themselves.” I believe Mr G. W. Russell was responsible for giving vent to that absurdity in the first place and, in repeating the statement, it is possible Mr Sole believed it to be strictly correct, and that it involved an injustice to applicants, for • loans. But the fact of the matter js, this. .. The £200,000 was lying idle in the AdVances Office and in order,Hhat it might ho made interest bearing (and it'must be remembered the Advances Department cannot afford to allow its moneys to be non-interest bearing), it jvas .temporarily loaned 1 to tlffi Treasury to be drawn upon as required. It might be argued that the Advances Office should have lent the money to the settlers straight away, and it is quite possible Mr Sole will say that is what should have been done, i Bub the £200,000 formed part of the year’s supply for loan purposes, the Government, as part of its policy, having,the right to borrow up to £1,500,000 in any one year for Advances to Settlers. This right is conserved in the State Advances Bill, introduced by Mr Allen ibis year as a consolidating measure, and which will shortly become law. J) such a line of argument as 1 have indicated is adopted, it would follow that the Government, borrowing say the full million and a half on the Ist of October or any subsequent date, would have to place out the full amount immediately, thus retaining not a single penny for the applications that would he lodged between that date and the date of the loan of the following year. The transaction to which Mr Sole takes exception is an ordinary business one. that has in no way prejudiced the application of any settler, and it should be unnecessary to add that the money, being at call was in no way tied up. It is certainly not the first time that one depai tment of State has availed itself temporarily of the unexpended balance at the credit'of some other de? partmout. Then there is Mr Sole’s statement re the Otahuhu Borough Council Loan, that £16,500 was lent to that body at 3] per cent, on Bill of Sale, which, with the same covert sneer at the Government’s expense, Mr Sole declares “is their stylo of ‘reform’ ” The security is not, as Mr Sole states “some machinery,” but the rates of the Borough, the “machinery” secured by bill of sale, being held as collateral security as required by the Local Bodies* Loans Act, 1908, section IG. The Massev Government is not responsible for that Act, nor was it possible for them to interfere with its procedure, even bad it wished to do so. Nor is it responsible for the loan itself, as that was approved by the Advances Board, m the early part of 1910, more than two years before the Reform Government came into office. And—just one point more—the waterworks for which Go's loan was granted are not in Mr Massey’s electorate, but in flic neighbouring constituency of Mamikau. T thought I had covered the whole of Mr Sole’s misrepresentations, hut I find (hero is still another statement requiring correction. This OLalmlui loan 'tas not made out of* the funds held tor Advances to Settlers, hut from moneys borrowed under the Loans to Local Bodies Act, 1908. y s it too much to hope that, when Mr Sole Hings his next cheap sneers at the Reform Government, he will make a little more certain of his “facts”? 1 must, apologise for the length of this letter, lint in view of the injustice which has been done to ihs Govern-

menb by your correspondent, I feel sure you will not object to its insertion. I am, etc., ERNEST A. JAMES, General Secretary, N.Z. Political Reform League. 41, Ballanco Street, Wellington, September 23rd, 1913.