ECONOMY WITHOUT PREJUDICE.

Taranaki Daily News, 29 October 1921, Page 12

ECONOMY WITHOUT PREJUDICE.

PUTTING OUR HOUSE IN ORDER.

The present financial stringency and restriction of trade and business !in various directions does not amount to an absolute elump, though, undoubtedly, it is a trying time for the producers and distributors within the Dominion. All are feeling the pinch more or less, just as all enjoying the previous good times of higtF prices, high wages and the activity of booming trade conditions wheri .orders and jobs were freely to be had. During the piping times of plenty it was unfortunately the case that our activities of production and service were generally relaxed. Economy was ignored, for were we not all out for a good time? Profiteering went on all round, and the lumper on the wharves, the fanner, merchant and others took their share of the chances that came to them. It is a waste of time to throw bricks at one another since all were in the carnival and enjoyed it while it lasted. Through the fall in prices of some of our staple products and the exigencies of exchange and credit, which have struck us like a douch of cold water, we are now rendered sober.

The Dominion is, like some other countries, in the position of the man who wakens with a very sore head in “the morning after the night before.” Of course we feel rather sick and disgruntled. If we had only economised more when times were booming, if we had only worked with more sense, if we had only laid out plans to meet these probable coming events. Why talk—if we had not beeu more or less drunk with sudden prosperity we would have been sensible —that is the sum total. Now we have got to straighten things out, the Dominion (that means all from the Government down) must economise whether we like it or not. There are those who have wakened with a load of depression on them, and they see yellow. These people are disposed to get on the house-tops and shniek out pessimistically that the country is on the brink of utter ruin. We can sympathise with the farmers who have oeen hit’ very hard by the fall in prices of wool and meat, yet Mr. Massey was right in decrying very strongly the outcries of pessimism. There is a danger that we may lose heart in the struggle, and then panie, with its evil results, would follow. Our ship of State has ridden through rough seas before, and can win through the present storm if the steering is right an.l we all stick to our work. Not to be optimistic or pessimistic, but just to look at facts clear-sightedly, and to work all together, is the plain course for us to take.

On the recovery of our debauch of prosperity many are not in an amiable mood and are ready to blame everybody but themselves. The Government will be told what it ought to have done by people who failed to do right themselves. The farmers are attacking the civil servants and transport workers, and these are attacking in return and wanting to know where the farmers spent their high profits of the five years. All this mutual recrimination is, in our opinion, quite futile. The issue before us is how we can best work together, as interdependent units of the Dominion, for the general betterment and what economies can each of iis practice to the end of national recovery. There are ,those in the House, and out of it, who have recently made attacks on the Civil Service, saying, in effect, that it is overstaffed, over-paid, and an excessive financial burden on the rest of the people of the Dominion. It is right that the value and costs of our public service should be reviewed. Necessarily public offices drew' a great supply of labor during the war which could not remain. What we think, however, is that much of the criticism of the Civil Service is misdirected, being of-the nature of general unspecified charges which fail to do justice to those who are serving the !)•> minion faithfully as State employees, The critics who call for the knife to be ic-ed on cne service and demand drastic cutting .10-./.i w thout any discriminative application are not solving any pr<o .em. Whilst the people who feel the burden of taxation may be hard hit -.hey should remember the civil servants, like themselves, have to live and they have their burdens and a right to a fair nearing. To make the other fellow do our economising is not just, as the duty is on all of us to carry our own share of the burdens of reconstruction. Our plan is that the application of economy shall be without prejudice and not directed at any one class as if they were the sinners and everybody else perfectly innocent. Our national finances do require close examination. The annual I appropriations call for review, as it is imperative that savings shall be effected on the heavy charges of Government with which the country is saddled. The line taken by the Home Government in appointing a business men’s committee to examine and advise as to where economies can be made with the best results is one which we think should be followed by our Government. The costs of Government administration, the commercial value of the business methods of the several Departments of State, the losses through duplication of operations, hampering routine nlethods and the absence of initiative are all matters that we a»e confident that a business committee would throw much light on to the saving of a good dial of useless expenditure. It is quite a comrpon practice in America, even in private concerns, to call in experts to review and advise, with beneficial results. Our Government might adopt the course of procuring the services of some highly-trained commercial men who, we believe, would indicate directions where economies could be effected. Independent judgment would effect economy without prejudice or bias, which is most desirable. (Contributed by the N.Z. Welfare League.)