THE GOVERNMENT'S WAY OF DOING Bustnss. A NYONE who is not
alarmed by the latest Interim Report from the House of Commons Select Com- mittee on National Economy must be almost incapable of alarm. The Report had not been published many hours • when the Ministry of Munitions issued a statement flatly contradicting important parts of it. It was unusual for a Ministry to act in this way, but of course it was equally • unusual for a Ministry to have such charges as appear in the Report made against it. In the present situation of • unusual for a Ministry to have such charges as appear in the Report made against it. In the present situation of • definite assertion and flat contradiction we cannot pretend to come to a final judgment ; there certainly ought to be further inquiries. We can fairly say, however, that the Ministry of Munitions and the Disposal Board carry on their business in a way which would soon bring a private business firm to ruin. It is obvious that a private firm would be destroying itself if it rendered itself liable to misunderstanding all along the line and put forward repre- sentatives who could not agree with one another's state- ments. We need not put the matter higher than that, because it is quite bad enough to know that the Government method of trading is confused and can hardly be explained, even if it should turn out in the end that the Ministry has not lost nearly so much money for the country as the Select Committee suppose. One more proof has been added to the list that the right road for national recovery is to avoid State management wherever possible and to replace the business of the country in private hands. We wonder, by the way, why the Ministry of Munitions should still be in a position to be criticized at all. Some time ago the Cabinet ordered the Ministry to cease acting as a trading department, but apparently the command has been disregarded. Examining the contract for the sale of the Slough depot, the Committee point out that the sale included all the mechanical vehicles, spare parts, supplies, pla,nt, &c., "wherever situate," which" at any time in two years from the date of the agreement would become the property of the Ministry or of the Disposal Board." The Committee bluntly describe such a vague sale as "contrary to the interests of the taxpayer." Obviously the greater the number of articles declared as belonging to the surplus the greater will be the profits of the purchaser. It is news to us that when we were told that the Slough depot had been profitably disposed of the sale included an indeterminate amount of material, some of it in France, and some of it apparently even in Italy and Salonika. Mr. Neylan, Finance member of the Disposal Board, was asked what the original cost was of the mechanical vehicles, spare parts, supplies, plant, &c., and he remarked that it was impossible to say. The Committee expressed the opinion that some effort should have been made to ascertain the value," and that at all events the unascertained value of articles outside England should not have been included in the sale. The Committee were also legitimately puzzled by the inform- ation that a park of vehicles at Abbeville had been sold for £450,000, and that this amount had been given to the purchaser of Slough. Apparently the Disposal Board, having made an estimate of the value of Slough plus all the material abroad, sold it to the first person willing to pay the price in private negotiation. "It was not a case, in our opinion," said Mr. Neylan, "where we could advertise or ask for competitive tenders." We wonder why.
The story of the sale of the St. Omer dump contains even more doubtful points. General S. S. Long, director of Messrs. Lever Brothers, offered to buy the dump for £460,000. The Ministry replied that the price was £500,000, which General Long refused to give. It is important to note that General Long's offer was based on a list which returned the number of heavy Leyland lorries as 687 and the total number of Leyland vehicles as 963. According to the evidence given before the Committee, Sir Philip Dawson then sent for Colonel Spurner, an official of the Ministry who acted as salesman for motor vehicles. As we have had.
occasion to mention before, Colonel Spurrier was formerly a director of the Leyland Motor Company, but at the begin- ning of the war he resigned that position. His two brothers, however, are still directors of the Company. Colonel Spurner was consulted as to the value of the dump and estimated it at £550,000. Sir Philip Dawson then requested him to find, a purchaser at E600,000. Colonel Spurner telephoned to the Leyland Motor Company naming this price, and the Leyland Company became the purchasers. But immediately afterwards a new list of the motor vehicles at St. Omer was produced, and in this list the number of heavy Leyland motor lorries which had been stated to General Long as 687 had risen to 963. It is a curious coincidence that the number of heavy motor lorries, which are'of course the most valuable transport vehicles, had risen to what was formerly represented to be the total number of motor vehicles, heavy and light combined. Of course, 'motors of all kinds were continually coming and going at St. Omer, but the disconcerting thing is that the Leyland Company made a bargain about £95,000 more valuable than they had any right to expect. It is astounding that there should be any doubt about the exact amount of material to be sold in such huge transactions as this. Although the value of the dump increased by a considerable sum after the negotiations for a sale had begun, there was, as in the case of Slough, virtually no competitive bidding. The same criticism must apply to the charges made to the Leyland Company for shipping the lorries to England. The Ministry of Shipping advised that the charge should be £30 per motor. Lord Inverforth reduced this to 115. Lord Inverforth argued that as barges which carried coal to France often returned empty to England, a change of £15 per motor was profitable. This is no doubt literally true ; nevertheless, the Leyland Company apparently got off easily at the expense of the taxpayer. Among the contradictions issued by the Ministry we must note the following : "The state- ment that Sir Philip Dawson instructed Colonel Spurner to obtain an offer of E500,000 from the Leyland Company is untrue." As we read the evidence, however, that statement was not made.
Before we leave this subject we must repeat what we have said on previous occasions about Colonel Spurrier. It is to the last degree improper that a public official should in the name of the taxpayer transact business with a company of which his near relations are directors. This is a violation of all the traditions of the Civil Service. If such practices be persisted in it will become impossible to keep our public life free from corruption. If Colonel Spurner, as seems to be generally believed, merely did what he was ordered to do, the blame must not fall upon him. He was put in a thoroughly false position, and the fault was with those who required him to act in this way. He was merely a subordin- ate and he did what he was told. Even if it could be proved by further inquiries that the Ministry made the best possible bargain for the country, immense harm would still have been done by the fact that a public official was allowed to transact public business with a firm in which his relations were interested, and also by the fact that Mr. Bonar Law, on behalf of the Government, thrust aside all criticism as superfluous and even malignant. In all his explanations and excuses Mr. Bonar Law entirely missed the point, and we can hardly believe that this was because he was incapable of understanding it. Colonel Croft and other critics of the transaction have never suggested or insinuated in any way
that Colonel Spurner acted corruptly. What they objected to, and very rightly, was that a public official should have been put in the false position we have &scrilncl. The unjust-attack-on-gallant-officer argument is deliberate dust- throwing. It is such practices as these which give rein to slander and help to swell the common, though mistaken, belief that our rulers are really indifferent to the ordinary rules of honesty, and that they are in office chiefly for the purpose of making what they can for themselves and their relations. Such beliefs are notoriously part of the material of revolution. It is not enough for men in high places to avoid corruption ; they must be just as careful to avoid every appearance of it through carelessness or arrogant indifference to criticism. That doctrine was as well stated as it has probably ever been stated in the whole history of Parliament by Mr. Lloyd George himself some years ago. We hope that it is not too much even now to expect that he will exhort his colleagues to act upon the principles of that memorable speech.
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