NOTES OF THE DAY.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1002, 17 December 1910, Page 4

NOTES OF THE DAY.

The shocking accident on the Dun-edin-Christckurch express, when a girl fell from the gangway between the_ dining-car and the next carriage while the train was travelling 30 miles an hour, will probably not result in the appearance of anybody in the dock on a charge of. manslaughter. Yet there lies at somebody's door the responsibility > for the child's death. The gangways connecting the carriages, as everyone knows who has travelled on the Southern express, are so ingeniously unsafe and murderous that even coolheaded and athletic men never clare to cross them without precautions. This is not the first death that has occurred through the persistence of the ltailway Department in retaining an arrangement that almost any sensible man could replace by a gangway just as 'effective and infinitely less dangerous.. The absence of a second guard rail is bad enough, but that is only part of the Department's stupidity. For when the train is whirling round a curve the footway shifts away at one end from alignment with the hand-rail. The attention of the Department must have been directed many times to this unnecessary menace to the life of every user of the Southern express, but the Department, true to the traditions of a groovy Administration, has done nothing. And the irony of the situation is that the Government which thus shows itself to be so stupid and so indifferent to the safety of the travelling public has actually forced an abominable Act upon the country on the ground that tho safety of the pubiie, menaced by municipal management of the tramways, must be taken in hand by the Public Works Department !

We publish this morning a letter from Mit. Joshua Jones concerning the report of the Parliamentary Committee on' his petition to be given the opportunity to be heard before somo ■ impartial tribunal on the merits of his long-standing claim. "Whatever the merits of claim may be we have not the slightest doubt that they have not been fairly investigated by the Committee in question. And we have not the least doubt either that Mr. Jones is not tho sort of man to sit down quietly under a sense of injustice. There cannot bo any doubt at all in the minds of those who have followed recent developments in conncctioh with this matter .of tho Mokau lands that there are quite a number of things that require clearing up'. An''attitude rectitude;^is" 1 "all very well "in its way, and 'm its place, but it does not carry one very far' sometimes. A- thoroughvinvestigationof facts is a great deal more satisfactory, and that investigation is persistently refused to Me. Jones. AVhy 1 It has to be bor.nc in mind that Mr. Jones underwent a somewhat similar experience, in England and when his claims were finally investigated by the Law Courts it proved a sorry day for some people; and it was not Mk. Jones who came off second best. If Ministers think the last has. been heard of this matter they are mailing a very grave error of judgment. They would be well advised to grant the investiga T tion asked for, and so put an .end to the doubt which exists. as to the sincerity of their professed desire to give Mr. -Jones the justice he is entitled to.

The manner in which the English election returns are being handled by the Press Association, or its sources of supply, is most discreditable. Whether the fault lies entirely with tho Association wo cannot say, but the messages as they reach 'us arc so contradictory and confusing as to make the task of sorting out an intelligent idea of tho position of parties at Home quite impossible. Yeste'rday, for instance, tho summary of returns gave Wales more seats than it was entitled to, the figures being 29 Government and 2 Unionist. It has only 30 seats altogether. To-day we are told that 24 Government and 2 Unionist members have been elected for Wales. Yesterday the figures for Ireland read: Eedmondites, 63; O'Brienites, 7; Unionists, 17. To-day_they read: Redmonrlitcs, 46; O'Brienites, 7; Unionists, 19. Yesterday the total number of members elected was given as 553; to-day,, with all'the changes noted, the total is 584. It is impossible to say which of the figures is correct. Yesterday, with 583 seats decided, the Government was shown to have a majority of 79. To-day, with 584 seats decided—that is one more than yesterday —the Government is shown as having a ma io r " ity of only 70—a drop of 9. ihe probability is that the figures for Ireland are wrong. _ The Nationalists, instead of having secured 46 seats, have probably secured 06 or 66 scats, and the Governments majority should be increased accordingly by 10 or 20 votes.. It is just possible that when the elections are finally over we may be supplied with something that is approximately correct.