POLITICAL NOTES.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1553, 24 September 1912, Page 5

POLITICAL NOTES.

THE WEEK'S PROGRAMME. PUBLIC SERVICE REFORM. Consideration in Committee of the Public Service Bill and in Committee of Supply of the remaining classes of the Consolidated Estimates are among the nioro important items of business which will occupy the attention of the House of Representatives this week. The House will probably go into Committee on the Public Service Bill to-day or to-morrow. Half the measure has been passed, and it is considered that the thirty-five . clauses which remain to be considered do not embody any particularly contentious proposals, so that the Bill will probably bo reported to the. House after next sitting. The Land Bill, which is to come/down early this week, will present some important aspects of the Government land policy. A belief prevails with- some members of the Opposition that the Bill will make provision for (he conversion of lands for settlement leaseholds (including renewable leaseholds) into freehold, but this supposition has not been officially confirmed. It in. a plnnk in the Government policv to provide laud for settlement as small fruit farms in such suitable areas as the worked-out gum lands in North Auckland. The Prune Minister stated last evening that if legislation were needed to further this policy it would probably be introduced by way of amendment when the Land Bill came up for consideration.■ The. House will be invited during this week to pass the remaining classes of the Consolidated Estimates. The Estimates of the Education Department provide for an expenditure of over a million sterling, and as the class is divided into fourteen votes ample opportunity will be given for debate on the education system. and its administration, The votes" fot Ura Stale Guaranteed Advances Department (.£527,142) and for Native Laud Settlement (J:350) have also to be passed. The Prime Minister'was'asked last evening when the Public Works Ktatemeut «ml Estimates might be expected to make their appearance. "The Estimates are in course of preparation," he replied, and he declined to supplement this information. It is generally expected, however, that the .Minister for Public Works will present his Statement to the House towards the end o: irxt wek or. at the beginning of the week following. No date has yet been fixed for a discussion of Legislative Council Reform by the House of Representatives. It is unlikely that either the series of resolutions recently placed on the Order Paper by the Prime Minister, or the short Bill proriding for a reduction in the term of appointment to the Council from seven years to three will come before the House this week.