SILVER BULLETS.
fro TEE Smree or sec "Srscr■ros."1 Silt,—The Chancellor of the Exchequer has told us lately that the issue of the war will depend largely upon the "silver bullet" and the possession of the "last hundred millions." This is not altogether an inspiring theme, but it has probably much truth in it. Following out this view, be has just placed an embargo upon further capital issues on the ground that we must "husband all our resources." A Commission of Inquiry into food prices and economy in food has also been appointed. Private individuals have been urged by their newspapers sometimes to economize, and sometimes to spend, but most people are compelled to economize. The Income Tax is doubled, and £350,000,000 has been added to the National Debt, with certainty of further borrowing. Meanwhile the peace Budget is over £200,000,000. In view of all this we may naturally ask what the Government is doing to carry out the principles which it is urging upon private citizens, and to ensure the possession of the "last hundred millions" ? It is to be feared that there can be no satisfactory answer.
The peace expenditure of this country has gone up in twenty years from £95,000,000 to approximately £205,000,000, and, so far, we have seen no signs of retrenchment. On the contrary, the cost of all the Government services unconnected with the war is steadily increasing. For example, a recent Return of the Board of Education shows an increase of over a million in our already enormous expenditure upon education. The cost of the Insurance Act is increasing in all directions, and the Report of the Departmental Committee upon excessive sickness (Cd. 7,607) contains proposals for yet further expenditure. Government grants for all sorts of purposes unconnected with the war continue to he lavished on all sides. So far as we know, the army of officials appointed for purely civic work is as large as ever. The stream of inquisitorial valuation and taxation papers under the Finance Act continues to pour in upon people, many of whom are fighting for their country. If any of us for philanthropic or other reasons employs a Belgian, he is obliged to pay his 3d. a week to the Insurance Commissioners, and there is an official in the background to see that he does it.
Apart from these considerations, the wastage is enormous : the State is paying out approximately twenty millions a year in sickness benefits under the Insurance Act, of which little more than one-third is contributed by the beneficiaries. Of this twenty millions at least a large part is only serving to encourage what is known under the euphemism of "excessive sickness." There is also admittedly huge wastage in the cost of administration owing to the inefficiency of the machinery. The tesponeibility for the feeding of school- children has now- practically been accepted by the State in all cases of poverty. That this is unnecessary in at least a proportion of the cases is clear from the following fact, which is a straw showing the direction of the wind. After long-uontinned Socialist pressure, the Education Authority has decided in certain parts of London to feed children on Saturdays and Sundays, as well as during the rest of the week. In these districts accordingly certain children were recently selected as suitable for this purpose, and their parents were notified. A large proportion of the selected children did not put in an appearance, which is sufficient proof that their parents not only could afford, but actually preferred, to feed them at home. Meanwhile, though it is universally admitted that the distress caused by the war is at present small, the average number of children fed daily in London is about 44,000, as against 36,000 last year. It would be possible to multiply illustrations from all depart- ments of the wastage that is going on in our national expenditure at a time when every shilling may be required to defend our very existence as a nation. The storm of Blue Books, circulars, and statistics irrelevant to the present crisis continues unabated The cost of printing these apart from the cost of the executive services necessary for their production, must be enormous. New Commissions or Committees of Inquiry, involving heavy expenditure, are appointed or foreshadowed at frequent intervals.
Fas est et ab bode doceri. We learn from a recent article in the Times, "Through German Eyes" (which we all read), that it is proposed in Germany to appoint an "Economic General Staff," whose duty it shall be, amongst other things, "to find useful work for a hundred thousand hands which hitherto have not known what work is, and to attract to produotive labour a hundred thousand beads which are only doing unproductive administrative work." Has not the time come when we should take some similar step ? What are the facts ? First, in regard to the "hundred thousand heads only doing unproductive administrative work," unproductive, that is to say, in regard to the present issues. Last year two Parliamentary Returns were issued respecting the number of persons "appointed without competitive examina- tion to any position of the public service with an annual salary of £100 and upwards." The first of these covers the eight years 1905.12, and contains two hundred and ninety- five pages quarto of names. The second covers rather less than a year, from February 27th, 1912, to the beginning of 1913, and contains seventy-one pages of names. An insignifi- cant minority of these are War Office appointments the rest are purely civilian. When we consider that these appoint- ments arc supplementary to the ordinary Civil Service, and that they only include the more highly paid officers, we may form some idea of the numbers engaged in what the Germans would call " unproductive administrative work." There is the further point that the great majority of those holding these posts are young men of military age who are diverted from the service of their country that is most needed at present. Of course every one recognizes that, war or no war, the Civil Service of the country must be carried on. But we have also to recognize that there was a huge and, as many people think, a mischievous augmentation of these services just before the war, and that there has apparently been no subsequent modifi- cation. One thing is clear—namely, that if we are to win upon the " last hundred millions " we cannot go on indefinitely
burning the candle at both ends.—I am, Sir, &c., B.
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