ENQUIRIES WITH BIAS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 77, Issue 25, 30 January 1934, Page 4

ENQUIRIES WITH BIAS

q’lIE Government appears to have again been guilty of settingup a biased Commission to bring down a conclusion in conformity to a preconceived judgment. This is not a pleasant charge to make against a Government, but the charge must stand. Impartiality is something that appears to be without merit in these days. It will be remembered that the Government assembled a committee of experts whose views were already known before the exchange experiment was embarked upon. Such a manoeuvre deceived nobody, nor will the same tactics impress anyone now that it has again been indulged in when setting up a Commission of Enquiry into the doings of certain .trust companies. The enquiry itself may be desirable, and the Government may deserve high commendation for taking the step of setting up such a Commission; but the fact remains that the findings of such a Commission are not likely to command that general respect to which it is entiled, seeing that two of the members of the Commission have already expressed their views on the matter in issue. Professor H. Belshaw has already gone on record on the matter into which he is to enquire. That shows bias, not that he has not come by his opinion without searching and impartial investigation on his part, but the bias is there because he has committed himself in public to one side of the issue before he has been called upon to hear the evidence yet to be adduced. Mr. F. E. Graham, of Christchurch, is a stockbroker, and as such, he is likely to have interests which are in direct conflict with the trust companies into whose activities he is to enquire and report on. His function in such circumstances is that of a witness, not of a judge. The same can be said of Professor Belshaw. This habit of setting up biased commissions appears to be growing. It is a dangerous practice, and the sooner it is stopped the better will be the state of affairs prevailing. Public confidence in the Government is not particularly strong at the present time, and the setting up of biased commissions undermines what confidence there is in the Government, while it invalidates any recommendations which those Commissions make.