MR SCOBIE MACKENZIE AT NASEBY.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1665, 17 September 1887, Page 1 (Supplement)

MR SCOBIE MACKENZIE AT NASEBY.

Mr J, Soobie Mackenzie addressed the Mount Ida electors at Naseby on the 9th inst. and made a vigorous incisive speech, of wbich we give the the telgraphio abstract. Every Ashburton electos, especially if ko is disposed tc suffer from Vogel-mania should read, mark, learn and inwardly digest it. Mr Mackenzie said he would say nothing but his honeßt convictions, as he believed the crisis was too seriouß. He did not oare whether they were popular or otherwise. The expenditure waa Bteadily going up and the income steadily v down. Travelling expenses aud other things, over wbich Ministers had full control, were scandalously increased. A large portion of these expenses was simply legalised spoil, brought home by an organised band of publio plunderers who, disregarding the toil of the taxpayer, periodically set out on marauding or filibustering expeditions against the people of New Zealand, that was what Ministers' travelling trips actually were. (Cheering) The oountry imperatively required a policy of stern unrelenting eoonomy, and a lower expenditure to get true retrenchment. The first step was to stop the loan money, then all the moneys for roads and bridges, buildings, Native lands, immigration and a host of other things would be thrown on the Consolidated Fund, and to make room for absoluie necessaries the people would by storn compulsion be compelled to effect such retrenchment as it has never for seventeen years entered into the heart of a New Zoalander to conceive. (Cheers.) Jobbery and corruption would die, At present, when the Government wanted to make themselves popular, they scattered loan money. If a parliamentary mouth was o'amorous it was shut with loan money; if a member could not recommend himself to his constituents by any other means, he could stagger home under a load of loan money. (Laughter.) It required no brains, only back. (Benewed laughter.) Sir Julius Yogel said the depression was due to the contraction of the loan expenditure ; how did that tally with facts ? In 1877 we were m a blazing Btata of prosperity, and the loan expenditure was I £1,400,000. In 1880 we went desperately down m depression, and the loan expenditure rose to £2,000,000. The whole thing was a delusion and a fraud. Beferring to railways, he caid that the proposal to complete all the lines, including the Otago Central, to Lake Hawea, was pure nonsense. Thn northern trunk line was not inoluded, nor contingencies. The Government had under-estimated the cost of their new proposals. . It really meant five millions, and the colony cou d not stand that. All the railways that really required finishing, m the proper sense of the term, inoluding the Otago Central ac far as Taieri Lake, could be finished for £500,000, and that sum must be obtained. Aa regarded land fund and settlement the career of the Government was a most awful record of bungling conceivable. In 1884 they had taken over the laud fund with a credit of £86,000, and they left it the other day with a deficiency of £54,000. Any Government by the expenditure of £80,000 could get Bettlers on the land as had been done lately on the speciol settlements ; but anyone who knew the difficulty of getting on m this part of the country with even 320 acres of good land could judge for himself whether the men carted on to thirty-two acres of remote bush land at the publio expense could take root thereon and flourishThe proper test of settlement was the deferred payment system, and under that more settlement went on under their predecessors than under the present Government. (Applause.) Dealing with the issue of the eleotion he said it was not education. Every attempt m the House to attack the educational system had been repelled by enormous majorities. No hing more ridiculour had ever been seen than the spectacle of the Premier rushing over the colony at the publio expense, and hysterica My screaming that he would go out of Parliament if the education system were touched. He (Mr Mackenzie) was a strong supporcer of State education. He advised the meeting if ever they heard the Premier or anyone else say he.wouid go out of Parliament if any department for which the peop c were taxed was touched to make to him tho ready answer of Englishmen " In God's name go." There was no department on earth too sacred to be touched. When the leading men of New Zealand were building up the present education system the Premier was ec gaged writing pamhlets against it. Sir Bobert Stout was m Parliament when the bill was brought forward, and he made a miserable carping speech, almost threatening to give it six months' shrift, and declaring that it was years too soon, and on the second reading he did not even record his vote. Mr Mackenzie then dealt with tho progressive property tax, and pointed out that the career of the Government had been simply a crusade against the property tax. Coming to protection, he said that was not the real issue. He read the Financial Statement of 1886, wherein the Government deolared that they absured protection, denounced it as[an unhealthy fostering of native industries and asserted that they would only assist commanding inqustries like the fisheries, and that only by bounties. Now Ministers were clamoring for higher duties as the salvation of New Zealand. Who had changed? Sir S. Stout said he had not ohanged for sixteen years, What were convictions with other men were simply briefs with Sir B. Stout. When the Premier was out of Parliament he was a legal practitioner; when he was ia Parliament he was also a legal praotitioner. He simply moved his praotice from the bar of tho Law Courts tothe bar of tbe House. That was the explanation. Give him enough support and he would take up a Parliamentary brief for anybody, and, of course he was not consoioua of any change. An order had been sent down to Sir Bobert by Borne half a dozen or so of his (McKenzio'B) opponents to send up a candidate for Mount Ida, and a oandidate had been duly sent, packed, labelled and addressed to them like so many feet of iron piping. (Laughter.) "This side up with oare." When they came to open that parcel they would find very littie m it. (Laughter.) There waa a telegram from the Premier Btuok up m a shop window m Nasby, to say that Mr Hodge oame m the Liberal interest ; yet all the Liberal oandidate oould say was, that he (Mr McMackenzie) had purchased his furniture from England. Could degradation, or oould infamy m politics go further? True Liberalism consisted m freedom, and so long as he was an Englishman he would purchase his goods where he pleased. It was deplorable that proteotion harpies should come to Naseby to attaok the very first principles of liberty. It was said that Sir Bobert Stout himself was coming up to speak for his faototum. He (Mr Maokenzie) invited him to do bo, and hoped the people of Mount Ida would Kindly remit his engagement, so that he oould take the same platform as the Premier. The raal issue was whether we were to retain a radically bad and vicious Government. Nothing on earth would induoe him to support them. Let that ba clearly understood, Mc Mjjgausie dosed. hii aO.dje.KJ with

an eloquent appeal to the eleotors to sup. port true and honest principles. A few questions were asked. A vote of thanks and entire confidence was unanimously carried, amid great cheering.