The Ashburton Guardian. Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. MONDAY, AUGUST 6, 1888. THE ELECT OF ASHBURTON.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1911, 6 August 1888, Page 2

The Ashburton Guardian. Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. MONDAY, AUGUST 6, 1888. THE ELECT OF ASHBURTON.

The action of the member for -Aehtrarton m moving his no-confidence motion on Thursday evening last has generally been condemned, and indeed it seems both carious and remarkable that Mr Walker should have at such a time brought on such a debate. Mr Walker is undoubtedly one of the ablest men with whom Sir Harry Atkinson has,,to contend, and though his position m the House is strong, it was evidently a bad bit of generalship to move m the direction he did without his party beine consulted. The result has not been so bad as it might have been, but there was much m the way the motion . was worded that led members to give m their allegiance to the Government for the time being rather than have the motion carried m the manner m which Mr Walker desired it.

The "Post" m an article on the subject says :~Mr Walker made a desperate, but perhaps not not very well considered, attempt last night to wrest from the Premier's hands the whip which was so unwisely put into them last session to enable him to lash the House during the duration of the present Parliament. The only result of the attempt was to afford the Premier an opportunity of cracking the whip pretty significantly over the heads of any members who might otherwise have been disposed to jib We pointed oat, when the reduction of the number of members after the expiration of the present Parlia ment was agreed to, that it virtually ensured-hir Harry Atkinson's occupancy of office for three years. He has bat to crack the whip and members must do as he tells them. The utterance of the word « djssolution » reduces the majority to the most abject obedience, for if a d.ssolution were to take place there would be 22 less members m the new House, and who could tell whether he might not be one of those doomed to political extinction. There is very little the House would not do avoid premature dissolution It is mno humor to perform the happy despatch, and consequently as soon as orer the Premier hinted at the dissolution, the House was reduced to submission. On its merits Mr Walker's motion was a perfectly f a { r and reasonable proposal, and we are convinced the majority would have been largely m its favor had members felt at liberty to vote astbeywuhed. That they did not feel so was too painfnlly evident. The Premier has a firm grasp of the heavy whip, and he knows how to flourish it over the heads of the Parliamentary team. They will probably yet hear it cracked loudly m respect to much more important motions than Mr Walker's amendment.

The " Daily Times " is. rather severe upon Mr Walker m his attempt to overturn the Government. Oar contemporary has the following to say on the subject:— The no-confidence debate which sprung ,up suddenly on Thursday evening was perhaps the most entirely feeble and purposeless debate of this kind that the, House has known. The mover, Mr W. C. Walker, is one of the most solid and sensible members of the Opposition, and we cannot conceive how he came to dispori himself m so ridiculous a fashion. There appear to be some doubts as to whether Mr Walker intended his amendment as . a no-confidence motion : he wished to inaugurate his leadership of the Opposition by a startling stroke of finesse which should put the Government into a quandary and appeal to the selfish instincts of the House. But a more contemptible failure it would be difficult to imagine. Opposition leaders, as a rule, try as much as possible to attack the doubtful or unpopular parts of the Government policy, but never before have we heard of a no-confidence motion based on the ground of one of the most universally popular portions of the Ministerial action. Whatever Mr W. 0. Walker may have intended, the Premier had plainly no choice but to treat the matter as one of confidence. The demand for the reduction of members was made at the elections last September m almost every constituency and the new Government consequently made it a principal feature m their retrenchment policy of last session. To stand aside now and allow their work to be undone would have been to convict themselves of insincerity, and to seek unpopularity without any solitary compensating gain of honor, principle, or policy. Mr Walker may have found a good many unpleasant truths to tell about the compromising policy ot the Government this session, but he had no solitary sign to Bhow of any change m public opinion upon the question he brought up. This is scarcely wagon, for

the Premier of the Colony to speak of Mr Walker's action as a piece of low cunning, but he might very fairly have termed it an exposure of fatuity and a most reprehensible waste of time.

Though as we have said, the motion was rather ill-advised and insufficiently considered, it has had perhaps a better effect than at first appeared when the result of it was made known. If the Opposition remain firmly together tnere is a good chance that their weight will tell on a question, devoid of side issues, and until there is.such a thing before the House " no confidence " motions are so much waste, of time to move.