TUESDAY, JULY 24, 1883. AN OVERGROWN CIVIL SERVICE.

Manawatu Times, Volume VIII, Issue 323, 25 July 1883, Page 2

TUESDAY, JULY 24, 1883. AN OVERGROWN CIVIL SERVICE.

The discussion which took pace m nhe Ho ufe on Friday night regarding the Estimates was highly instructive. The Government were plainly asked by Mr Swanson, and » number of other members, to take baclc the Estimates and reduce them by £50,000. This of course would have been eating the leek with a vengeance, and however " 'umble " the Major may be whei; he is m a minority he is not the man to show the white feather while he possesses a good working majority. The Estimates so far were therefore passed virtually without amendment. The point raised, how* ever, is not likely to be lost sight of by the taxpayers. The Civil Service has vastly outgrown the requirements of colony, and iB so rapidly increasing

m political influence that unless something is done to check its growth, it will be a power m the land that will bo able to defy almost any Government. If things go on as at pi'esent, New Zealand bids fair to exist for the Civil Service, and not the .Service for New Zealand. An organisation like the Civil Service naturally grows, and expands ; influences are at work within it which cause its senior members to make oilices for their friends' sons. Once tint son, or nephew, or friend of an Under- Secretary gets"iv," he never gets " out,' ? but is promoted as fast as can be done consistent with safety to the young man's billet. Wo venture to say that if three good business men, — men who were employers of labour, and knew how to economise time, and simplifyfcthe work of the Civil Service — were to take the matter m hand, they would within a yearreduce "the Estimates, not by £50,000 merely, but hy £100,000, It is impossible to go through New Zealand without seeing everywhere signs of the overgrown character of the Civil Service, while m Wellington the array of Government officials is enormous ; and all to govern some half»tnillion of people! In tbe House on Friday, Mr Macan« drew, with his strong Scotch sense said, "he did not think they could get a Government to make the retrenchments that were necessary. Nothing but revolution could do it. They were living m a fool's paradise, e»s Mr Turn bull had showr tbe previous evening. Their electric lights and marble mantelpieces, cosh ting L7O, and other extravagances m the House were scandalous. They were living on borrowed money, and had got a wrong system of public and private extravagance. They should go to first principles, and some radical change was needed to begin reduction from the top downwards." The above sentences are pregnant with truth. Perhaps fortunately for this colony we have no focus as France has m Paris, England has m London, or Victoria m Melbourne. We have four large centres — two m each Island — and the fact prevents united action by the people. But sooner or later the men of New Zealand will make their voice heard, and Parliament Buildings will echo with the sound ; and that voice will be this — That the cursed system of patronage and bloodsucking which obtains m this colony m the Civil Service must give place to a purer and better states of thing, under. which men of merit will receive promotion, aud useless creatures will be sent about their business, to chop wood, crack stones, or till the ground, instead cf spending useless and unproductive lives, fattening through the taxation which is grinding honest and hardworking settlers to the ground.