Untitled

Colonist, Volume LX, Issue 14650, 2 March 1918, Page 2

J In consequence of disclosures or cle- • falcations in the. Commonwealth Defence Department the Federal. Cabinet appointed a, Royal' Commission^ with a well-knctyvn commercial man at its head, to examine into .and.; report upon = its financial and business management. The defalcations were conducted so simply iand discovered so accidentally (the Mel;bourne "Argus" says) that the fear ! was engendered that there might be | many more of the same kind in operation. By a simple conspiracy a private was promoted through various mythical ranks, receiving Very actual and I tangible payments .iv increasing : amounts, until ere long, flad the fraud jnot been discovered,- he might have Ibeen drawing the pay of a colonel or a ; brigadier-general. A clerk for a considerable- time drew the pay of a whole ■■lb.itisili.oiv wh\clt- never existed, of had ! ceased to exist, and; joyfully passed it : on to a company of- bookmarkers^-about ' whose existence and "prosperity there Svas no doubt Avhatever —until the total . exceeded £6Q,0Q0;: