SOON TO MEET.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1043, 4 February 1911, Page 4

SOON TO MEET.

THE REPRESENTATION CO MM IS* SION.

AFTER FIVE YEARS.

Prospective candidates at the approach* ing election will soon be devoting a deal i of anxious attention to that body of" men called tie Representation Commission. -

Every five years this body conies before the public. In a qukt way it causes a certain amount of worn- to tho~a concerned in political affair's. Its ( u>cisions may make a considerable difference to an electjrate. Act of Parliament directs that it shall "divide NewZealand into electoral districts for the apportionment of the representation- of the people in the House of Representatives . - ." The apportionment is to he oil a population basis, and this, in a country where expansion is rapidly progressing, means a continual alteration of boundaries — a little lopping off hero ami a little addition there. The trouble, of course, is that this lopping off or addition may make all the difference to an electorate. It may bring in an unresponsive, township pi* suburb, or it may ■ leave a bunch of hearty supporters out. Hence the prominence of the. commission in the public cye_ when they automatically lcc.ii into being. It is even possible that wholo electorates may be demolished, and the scattered particles tacked on to others contiguous. • .It is a little early yet to. speculate upon any probable results of tho commission's sitting. It cannot ccinmenco its duties until after the census returns are complete. The census this year is to be taken on April 2, and the population returns will be. made available as soon as;, possible to en-able tha commission to commence its labours at once. . It may be expected that an • increase m tha number of members for the North Island this year will be found necessary. Along the North Island Main Trunk line, for instance, townships have sprung np, and settlement -has greatly increased since • the last sitting of .the commission. In other parts of the North . Island, particularly on -the East Coast and in portions of the Auckland province pioneering has also - gone on, apace. The returns of the commission must be available within three montha of the •announcement of the census. There are really two commissions, ona for each Island. They first meet, however, as a joint body, in Wellington, and consider a general basis of work. They 'then devote themselves exclusively to their respective spheres. Each consists of ' five members. Tho. North Island commission consists of the SurveyorGeneral, the commissioners • of Crown lands: for the Auckland and Taranaki land districts, and twp members appoint-* ed by the House of "Representatives, wjio must - not be Civil Servants' or members of Parliament, and, who are not to be appointed to the legislative Council within two years of the sitting of the commission. The South Island commissioners are the commissioners of Crown lands for the Canterbury, and Otago I.ind'.districts, and other two ai>nointed ns in tho case of the North Island. The two "unofficial" members of tho last commission for the North Island were Messrs.' W. H. Quick and H. S; WardeU, -and for the South Messrs. Reeves and T. S. Weston- • The new electoral boundaries do not come'.into being until after tho dissolution of Parliament. . Former redistributions of seats hav4 resulted as follow, as far as the twa Islands are concerned:—

North South Island. Island, is9i 30 . 40 1896 31 39 1901 .. 34 ,16 1906 35 33