The Wanganui Chronicle. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 8, 1950. THE MAYOR’S RELIEF FUND

Wanganui Chronicle, 8 December 1950, Page 4

The Wanganui Chronicle. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 8, 1950. THE MAYOR’S RELIEF FUND

R. G. TALBOYS deplores the attitude of-people who were questioning the administration of the Mayor’s Relief Fund, but in so doing he is wholly wrong. The public has a right to ask any seemly questions concerning this fund and its employment in Wanganui. It is publie money that is being distributed and the public has a right to know how it is being administered. To discover this it is necessary to ask questions. To ask questions is not to doubt the bona tides of the administration of the fund, but without first questioning and seeking information none can know whether the account is being administered in a desirable manner.

In some centres the administration of the Mayor's Relief Funds has left much to be desired, and it is only right and proper for anyone who feels so disposed to enquire as to how the fund is being administered in Wanganui. None knows the problems of administering aid to the needy better than Mr. A. E. Halligan for he was Wanganui’s first citizen during the dark days of the Great Depression. It then became apparent that then? were people who were always in the front rank of those who made requests for assistance and the problem of helping the people who most deserved assistance was how to get beyond these “front-rankers” as they came to be called. It was no doubt because of this experience extending over years that Mr. Halligan asked of the Mayor the pertinent question as to the type of persons who called upon him for assistance from the Mayor’s Relief Fund. Mr. Rogers was frank enough to state that many came with a cock-and-bull story with the object of extracting money wherewith to buy drink. This is the full justification for the questioning of the relief fund by anyone who desires to know how .things have been and are being conducted. Without questioning such unsatisfactory wastage of money could be continued. Mr. Rogers stated that this practice of subsidising had largely been stopped and his memory for faces is a great aid to him. Possibly it is but that it is an unscientific basis for the administration of charity. Remembering faces is not enough of a safeguard in this connection. ,

The real objection to the administration of the Mayor's Relief Fund does not rest upon any unsatisfactory feature in the actual administration of the fund but in the unfair advantage which it gives to Mr. Rogers as a public man. By personally administering the Relief Fund he builds up a personal following for a partisan representation of a public office. His hold on the Mayoralty is thereby strengthened in a manner which does not admit of competition. Give any City Councillor or other public man the personal administration of the relief fund and his vote at. the election following would most probably improve by a thousand votes.

It is not to be implied that Mr. Rogers in the administration of the fund plays party politics nor that he makes donations which are not in his honest opinion thoroughly justified, but even within appropriate limits of honest and capable administration he gathers to himself support through such distribution of largesse which is personal to himself and is the inevitable result of these, activities. It would be the same were any other man occupying the Mayoral chair and distributing the fund on a personal basis. The fund should be distributed by a City Almoner who should be free from party political associations and not the occupant of any publie office. -Until that is done then anyone who desires to know the facts concerning the Maypr’s Relief Fund and its administration is entitled 1o ask whatever appropriate questions he thinks to be justified. No objection can validly be levelled against such action and no objection should be taken. To attempt to stifle legitimate enquiry concerning any matter of public administration is a disservice to public well-being.