THE HINE CHARGES.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 985, 28 November 1910, Page 8

THE HINE CHARGES.

COMMENTS BY THE PRESS. After briefly reviewing the several charges brought forward by Mr. Hine, M.P,, the Christehureh "l'ress" says editorially:—"Whether tho Government will take any further action in regard to any of tlieso cases has yet to be seen. In tho meantime, however, Mr. Hino deserves great credit for having undertaken a disagreeable task and for showing how the wise resolution passed by tho Houso in 1886 has been disregarded. The committee now suggest that legislative force should be given to that' resolution, by making it illegal for a member of Parliament to act on his own bohalf or on behalf of any other person in negotiating the sale of an estate to the Crown. If the Government has any regard for tho honour.of Parliament, it can do no less than adopt the committee's advice. Tho closing of the session might well be postponed for an additional day in order to enable a Bill embodying the recommendation to be passed." . The "Wanganui Chronicle" • says:— "The report of tho Parliamentary Committee entrusted with the duty of investigating the allegations made by Mr. Hine, tho member for Egmont, concerning the connection of certain persons, members and ex-members of the Legislature, with.fcransactipns'of aques-, tionablo character, was presented to Parliament last'night. The substance of tho report is published in another column, and a perusal thereof will convince any unbiased • reader that' Mr. Hine's attitude has been v . amply justified,, and fliat he is. entitled to be credited with having rendered tho Dominion a great and valuable service. Tho committee find, to put it briefly, that the majority of- tho charges made by the member for Egmont have been proved; that Messrs. Symes, Major, and Kaihau each received payment from interested persons" for services rendered by them in their representative capacity, and, that in accepting such payments they were guilty . of. 'improper conduct,' and that while some of these .things do not amount to a breach of anyru'lo or. law, the facts which have been revealed in evidence are such as to convinco tho committee that 'legislation .is necessary to prevent such payments being accepted by members of Parliament.' *■-.'.

"In regard to tho' Flaxbourne case, tho finding of tho committee is favourable to the Hon. T. K. Macdouald, M.L.C., and absolves that gentleman from any improper association with the transaction; but Mr. Kaihau, M.P., and tho two .. (Messrs. Symes and 'Major) are far from "being in like enviable positions. They aro not law-breakers, certainly; but they aro men who have hot scrupled to put money into their . pockets as payment for services were' it not for tho position they occupied as members' of the House of Representatives, they would never have been asked to render. The average taxpayer will not require to be convinced that this sort of thing ,i 3 not conducive to clean politics. Tho practico is one which might easily develop pernicious consequences, and.play havoc with the fundamental principle of democratic representation. That the committee is alive to-'tho danger is evidenced by the recommendation attaciied to their finding, and tho country may well hope' that the Legislature • will lose no timo in placing tho necessary prohibitory legislation on-tho Statute Book." .-■.-■•

The "Otago Daily Times," in the course of its article, says:—"No'intelligent person who has closely followed the evidence that was submitted beforo tho committee, and who has discriminated, between that which was really pertinent to tho issue and that which very freely admitted, was entirely irrelevant, can nave formed any other conviction than that the majority of the charges— and these not the least-gravo of them— wero amply ; proved, and tliat Mr.. , Hino has performed a'real service to the community in having undertaken the necessarily unpleasant task of exposing tho improprieties of the persons who were implicated. We shall make no attempt this morning to analyse tho evidence that was presented, upon one side and the other, to tho committee. - In some of the cases that were investigated any analysis would, indeed, bo superfluous. Such cases are those in which the committee was forced to* , tho conclusion that .'Mr. Symes/ l ex-M.P., and . Mr. Major, ex-M.P., wero guilty of improper conduct. Wo may only note in this connection what seems to be tho inconsistency between the finding of tho committee with respect to the rcceptnnce by Mr. Symes of a gift of £300 from the late Mr. Alfred Bayly towards tho payment of his election expenses in 1905 —election expenses which aro limited by law to £200 and which, according to the sworn return furnished by Mr. Symes, amounted in his case at that timo to its finding with regard to tho acceptance by Mr. Kaihau, M.P., of a gross payment of £2000 from the Ngatitahinga tribe out of the proceeds of the sale by it of tho Te Akau Block to tho Government. In Sir. Symes's case the committee very properly finds that the acceptance" of the sum of £300 was improper. But in Mr. Kaihau's caso the finding is that there was nothing in the transaction that amounted to any breach of the law. There was no - broach of tho law in either case, but the transaction was as improper in the ono instance as , in the other, and it is difficult to see why the committee should express a more lenient judgment respecting the payment to the, membor of the present Parliament than it expresses regarding the payment to the ex-member.