SOMETHING ACHIEVED.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 229, 27 September 1928, Page 6

SOMETHING ACHIEVED.

In the history of Parliaments there has been many a dreary all-night sitting to less purpose than that produced in Wellington by the Mental Defectives Bill. The ''Herald' , scolds everybody concerned in the opposition, inside and outside Parliament, for responsibility in an unseemly exhibition. Certainly all-night sittings are not particularly edifying, but to suggest that there was party feeling or anything petty behind this is absurd and insulting. The "Herald" ignores quite a number of facts. First, the Minister distinctly promised that the Bill should be considered on non-party lines. Yet when the Government makes it a party measure, its critics are censured for their opposition! Then there is the fact that the opposition to the Bill inside and outside the House is based upon vitally important principles, and is well informed. Are the views of professors, which have just been reinforced by expert opinion in the Old World, to be swept aside as the product of ignorance or party feeling? Can it be seriously suggested that when Mr. Peter Fraser spent hours putting together material for a series of excellent articles in the ''Evening Post" he was actuated purely by a desire to injure Mr. Coates? The "Herald' , also ignores the fact that the Reform Party itself is divided on the subject; that the other day one of the leading Reform newspapers roundly condemned the Bill. Moreover, in

Tuesday night's debate more than one Reform member criticised the wording "of vital definitions in the Bill. Lastly, was not the Minister himself, by refusing to say what he Would concede, partly responsible for the length of the sitting? The Bill emerged from Committee less dangerous than when it went in, and the public cannot be blamed if it attributes this gain to the persistence of the opposition rather than to the reasonableness of the

Minister,