Preface
1X
the grant is made is “efficient.” By this expedient
the citizen delivers himself bound hand and foot into
the custody of the official expert, who is able, by
declining to regard the service as efficient, to compel
him to raise more money in rates under penalty of
“losing the grant.” It is seldom that we meet an
expert who does not think that more money ought to
be spent in his own particular department: the local
authority or the individual ratepayer who hopes for
a reduction of rates from “efficiency grants” is only
to be likened to the proverbial donkey induced to
proceed by a wisp of hay hung in front of his nose.
“ What matter,” some will say, * if rates and taxes
increase, provided efficiency is obtained 2” Of course
if efficiency is to be judged simply by amount expended,
this plan of giving control of the purse to experts in
each department is an excellent one. But if it is to
be measured by more reasonable standards, we may
well doubt. The means of the community are limited,
and a certain proportion between the different kinds
of expense, both public and private, must be observed
in order to make these limited means go as far as
possible. There is nothing in the scheme to provide
for this requirement, and if we suppose the difficulty
to be got over by the establishment of real parlia-
mentary control of expenditure, we have still to prove
that the rule of the experts will be beneficent in each
of the departments taken separately.
Doubtless expert opinion is exceedingly valuable,and
nothing can be more desirable than that the national
government should maintain an adequate force of
inspectors, drawn from various classes and trained in
various institutions, and that these inspectors should