The Gisborne Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 1908. THOSE GRAZING RUNS.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVI, Issue 2308, 29 September 1908, Page 2

The Gisborne Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 1908. THOSE GRAZING RUNS.

Our evening eon temporary, -as the local 'guardian of Governmental interest,s, is greatly concerned at the suggestion that anything iinpropor has occurred in regard to the renewals of grazing -runs in this district. In an cditori.il published last evening it takes the opportunity to extol the Minister-of Lands as one incapable of wrong and to gently chide a fcor-rosppnde-nt who had ventured to impugn the conduct of the Hon. Mr. Carroll. All this is, of course, entirely laudable in a Government journal and the rambling statement which purports to describe the true position of affairs is freely punctuated with indignation that anyone should venture to east aspersions upon a Cabinet Minister. As a matter of fact, our own references were not aimed directly .at the Minister of Lands himself but at the Department over which, ho inis control, and in tills connection our contemporary makes an interesting admission embodied in tlie following extract concerning Mr. Hall’s run:

The ranger’s report was to the Board, -and if the Board or some sorvant of the Board made a mistake in transmitting a recommendation to the Minister and did -not attempt to rectify the mistake fill a month later, how is the Minister to be hold blameworthy or to have given way to corrupt political influence It is not tho Minister and Mr. Carroll who have got themselves into “a bit of a mess,” as ihe correspondent alleges, but the muddlo is clearly one that has been made on tho part of the Board, o by the Commissioner acting for the Board.

Tho answer to tho point here made is very obvious. Tho Hon. Mr. McNab cannot, of course, prevent -a Land Board or an officer of his Department from making a mistake, but ho cam and should take the earliest opportunity of rectifying such error, or if the error he irreparable ho can at least explain matters freely and frankly to a public that is entitled to the fullest confidence from its highest officials. Failing this, ho must himself accept tho full responsibility for any blundering or -intentional injustice, with all tho consequences that liny ensue. Our contemporary pleads for delay before condemning tho Minister, but when we remember that t-lio matter has already been before Parliament moro than onco and Mr. McNab has made an official statement yet has declined to explain how it happens that the Land Board’s resolution was not given effect to it is surely ludicrous to talk of critics as “jumping to hasty conclusions.” The Minister may—and for the sake of liis personal reputation we -hope he is—bo free from direct responsibility for tho bit of shady work that has been going on, but as head of the Department it -is his duty to locate where the blamo lies for tho mistake that -has occurred and to make .a free and frank explanation when asked in the House. Instead of that he chooses to seek refuge behind an explanation which, whilst correct so far as it goes, does not dividgo the whole of the f-act 6. As wo have already made clear the public has a right to know how it happened that Mr. Frederick Hall, a Government supporter, could got the whole of his run back in face of the Land Board’s decision that it- was to bo subdivided, and there is not the slightest doubt but tho .answer will have to be given sooner or later.