The Sun FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 1919. OUR DEMORALISED RAILWAY SERVICE.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume VI, Issue 1735, 5 September 1919, Page 6

The Sun FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 1919. OUR DEMORALISED RAILWAY SERVICE.

It is no doubt very inconvenient J and disconcerting for a Government] on the eve of a general election to be called upon to explain why its railway system has broken down and become a byword throughout the community. Consequently there is to be a Royal Commission to make an investigation. Governments have a way of spawning Royal Commisr sions at short notice when the public is calling angrily for someone's head on a charger, and their sole function is to divert immediate attention from ,fbe politicians who are clearly and plainly to blame for incompetence and the mismanagement of the work they are paid by the country to perform. The commission perambulates the country at great expense, examines a horde of witnesses, and eventually produces a report destined to be interred as quickly as possible in the miscellaneous section of the "Appendices to the Journals of the House of Representatives." Meanwhile the politicians who have demonstrated their unfitness for public office slide gracefully out of their predicament and continue to draw the emoluments attached to Ministerial positions from which they should be expelled with ignominy. There is no necessity whatever for a Royal Commission to discover what is the matter with the New Zealand railway system. It is as,plain as a pikestaff (1) that it is the worstmanaged business in the community; (2) that it is conducted on lines that would bring ruin and insolvency to any privatelv-managed concern; (3) that its political and administrative heads have been deficient in capacity and foresight; (4) that inster-1 of being, as it should be, one of the most powerful factors In promoting the prosperity and development of the country, this great department is hampering production in all directions; and (5) unless it is promptly and radically reformed it will cost the taxpayers and producers millions of money instead of helping to create wealth and put money in their pockets. Nearly all the great business enterprises of the Dominion from the Union Steam Ship Co. down to any important manufacturing concern can show a remarkable development and expansion during the last five years. They did it in spite of the. disabilities imposed by the war. When their men were takffn away they found others and utilised female labour. When their material was commandeered they reached out for substitutes, and by resorting to all kinds of expedients they not onfy kept their businesses together but enormously increased their turnover. As a contrast, the Railway Department emerges from the war with its services ridiculously curtailed, with its customers driven away, its charges excessive, and its facilities fcr handling traffic as obsolete and as inadequate as when Mr Hiley made his famous report in 1914. By some unhappy stroke of fortune Mr Massey on assuming office in 1912 passed the portfolio of railways over to Mr Herries. This cultured and scholarly gentleman, with an unrivalled knowledge of the English Turf, was, as events have since proved, the worst choice that could have been made. He and his imported railway manager never seemed to realise that, as the war was giving an amazing impetus to business enterprise of every kind, the Railway Department should have responded and made some effort to keep pace with the ever-increasing demands being made upon it by the mercantile and farming community. Far from it. Instead of adopting a progressive policy, the political and administrative heads made the war an excuse for doing nothing. Things went from bad to worse till the fuel question began to look serious. Here again Mr Herries and Mr Hiley showed a lamentable lack of foresight. They allowed their stocks of coal to grow smaller and smaller, till they were caught with a supply that was quite inadequate to maintain a normal service. It is perfectly well known in business circles that this

trouble was brought about i» the first place by the disinclination of the Railway Department to pay the current rates of freight on coal from Newcastle. Then when the shortage of shipping and, finally, the seamen's strike, reduced the supply of imported coal to negligible proportions, the railway service, which Mr Hiley was paid £3OOO a year to manage, and Mr Herries £I2OO. and etceteras to supervise, broke down. The actual loss, in revenue will not be known till next year's railway accounts are published, and the loss to the community will never be known. Still, if the Royal Commission is equal to the job it may help Mr Herries' successors wiHi some useful suggestions that may help when they set about reorganising the Dominion's forty-million pound land transport business, with a view to restoring some semblance of efficiency, and regaining the confidence of the public. To, 1 these we would like to add one of our own, and it is that the Government should recogn s*? 5 *? the necessity 'of paying for brains in the railway servict. Surely the day is past when responsible officials should be expected to handle business running into hundreds of thousands of pounds anrcualjy or direct large clerical and mechanical staffs in return for salaries about equal to the wages earned by an energetic coalminer? A large business house does not expect to get a departmental manager of proved ability and experience to supervise the trade of a< province under £7!}o or £IOOO a year, and sometimes a good deal mor» is paid. But a man may be 30 years in the railway service and rise to the position of district traffic' manager on a salary w/sich is on £ par with the amount the Arbitration Court recently prescribed for a I newspaper reporter.