The Word Has Gone.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 579, 8 October 1932, Page 8

The Word Has Gone.

Vagrant Verse.

By

SINBAD.

W E VE just had ail Expenditure Commission, On Government affairs to make report; These worthy gentlemen proceed to dish in A potion of a rather bitter sort. They show the kind of policy that’s needed, And say to Forbes and Coates and Co. with glee “Of course, you can never be like it, But be as like it as you're able to be.” Extravagance, financed with borrowed money, In Railways, Public Health and Public W orks Has brought us to a state no longer funny; We know the truth at last, and how it irks. The word has gone to bosses of departments Who year by year with fresh demands “ Of course, you can never be modest, But be as modest as you’re able to be.” Of local bodies jostling one another, Yet all collecting fast the public's gold, Till with their rates all enterprise they smother, There must be a reduction, we are told. County Councils must unite when the Commission Sends .forth the word united they must be; Of course, we cannot do without them, But we’ll do without at least one out of three. The good old maxim, “ Spend while you have plenty”; The good old slogan, “ Borrow, boom and bust ”; They sounded quite all right in 1920, But in this year of grace we bite the dust. So let’s give thanks to Shirtcliffe and his heroes— Their call comes just as much to you and me: “Of course,-«you can never be saving, But be as saving as you’re able to be.”