JOTTINGS FROM "HANSARD."

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume VI, Issue 525, 26 July 1881, Page 2

JOTTINGS FROM "HANSARD."

MR WISTON ON DB POLLEN'S PENSION.

I for one should be sorry to suppose that any Minister would co far forget all that was due to himself and the country ho serves as to pormit himself to act the part of a dishonest man, and to give another a pension to which he wan not entitled, in the hope that he himself might some day be dealt with in the same unfair, unjust and dishonest way. I should be aorry to think that the Civil servants would play intn each others' bande, and descend to the infamy which the honorable gentleman credits them with descending to. The Civil servants, no doubt, do look after themselves, and it is quite right that they should. MR DE LAUTOUR COMPLIMENTS THE MEMBER FOB GREY VALLEY. I think the speech we have just hoard for the honorable member for Grey Valley does credit to the goodness of his heart, and I think it bears out in a wonderful dejgree the argument of the honorable member for Cheviot that the tendency of human nature is for the members of one" rank to assist and help each other. I congratulate the honorable gentleman upon his emancipation, and upon his accession to this House ; and I am glad to liftve this opportunity of expressing, as a yuii'ig member of this Homie, at any rate in age, my belief thai lie will be an accession to our m.-ikij, Tuo honorable genlletuun has •Ufio nutiirally greater faith in a • legal tribunal limit I myself have. I should bo very sony to think that the important

interests of the great officers of the State. when they cease to actively take a part in tho Civil Service or in the government of the colony, should be relegated to our legal tribunals. I think it is a strain that, under our present system, the procedure of those tribunals will not bear. MR DX LAUTOUR ON THE POLLEN PENSION. As the member for Cheviot has said, it is one Civil Servant handing public money to another, and he in turn receiving public money from his fellow. Such a system is vicious, end I think that the House will do wrong if it does not take this opportunity of protesting against these pensions and tho manner in which they are granted, and at the same lime passing as moderate a sentence ac it possibly can in the case before us. I hope tho honorable gentleman will adhere to hia motion ; and I think it will be well for the Government, if they vote for or against tins motion, not lo put themselves in the position of having to use their own forces to protect themselves from the review of this House. A LITTLE ROW IN THE HOUSE. Mr McLean : There was lately a proposal made by the Government to take one of the Ministers ofi the Committee and to put some other member of the House on in his place. An Hon Member: It ia done. Mr McLean : Well, I know it has been done, and one other gentleman in this House was substituted for the Minister. Some of those members who voted against Dr Pollen on the Committee, as it were, stood up and said this, that in equity he was entitled .to his pension.—(No.)—The honorable gentleman saya *'No." I did not refer to him. I knew perfectly well, that whatever his chief says he must do Mr Speaker : Thot is an insinuation that ought not to be indulged in. Mr Moss : I did not hear it, and took no notice of it. Mr McLean : I withdraw it. I did not refer to the honorable gentleman at all. I referred to gentlemen on the Committee who take an equitable view of the case. .... 1 have only this to say of him (Dr Pollen) as an old colleague, that during all the time we held office tegetlier he never pressed his claim on the Government of which he was a member, but deliberately left it over until another Government should come in. It is due to Dr. Pollen that I should say that. And, Sir, why did not the next Government deal with it ? Ih it not on record that letter after letter he wrote, and never could get. an answer to hie communications ? Iβ that a proper way for a Government to deal with an old officer of the Government ? It was using him very badly. They ought to have said Yea or Nay. An Hon. Member: They said Nay. Mr McLean : They, never did until nearly the time they got turned out. An Hon Member: Tea, they did. Bead it. MB READER WOOD GIVES HIS OPINION ABOUT PfiNSIOKS. I have always been opposed to the system of pensions, and I always shall be. The Colonial Treasurer told us last eeeeion that we were now paying at the rate of £18.000 a year for pensions, end if it had not been for the action taken by a few members of-the House in 1871, when we put a stop to pensions for the future, the amount would be infinitely larger. Fer the first three years doling whioh the system was in operation the poiieions ac-. cumulated to something like £10,000 They have now increased to £13,000, and if it had not been for the stoppage fcto which I have referred I believe that nearly half of so much of the colonial revenue as Iβ devoted to Civil Service salaries weald been absorbed, or, at any rate, a very large portion of it. There would have been something like rb active and a passive service, and it ia not at all unlikely that in a very short time the passive service wonld have been more extensive than the active one. MR MOSS HITS OUT AT THE HON MEMBER FOR CHEVIOT. To-night, Sir, 1 wae much surprised when I saw the honorable member for Cbeviot moved to tra-vorse the 'motion brought down by the honorable member for Auckland City East. The honorabte member moet -know perfectly well that his amendment is merely solving tho whole thing. He must know perfectly well that in adopting that course lie is putting hitnself into a position of antagonism to the recommendation which the committee has brought down, and for which he himself voted.—(No.) —There ia no doubt about it. lam exceedingly eorry to ccc that honorable member placing himself in sucb a position. 1 have observed him more than once ready to take upon himself the very uncomfortable duty— which I am sure he mast feel uncomfortable—of doing work for the Government which they find it very difficult to pet any one elee to do for them. If the Government are in a difficulty about the Civil servants the honorable member conies to the front. They are in a difficulty now, and he comes to the front, and with an air of bulldog resolution, with an air of independence, moet admirable to behold.