A GREAT REFORM

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2324, 4 December 1914, Page 13

A GREAT REFORM

One of the political offences for which the Conservative Wardist Party has to answer, before the'.;' country to-day is that of attempting, to block the. great constitutional reform by whioK the Massey Government has democratised the Legislative ;- Council, and substituted popular eleotion for Ministerial patronage-.'' "■'•'";:•■•.■'■■ '■''■■}■■:: The change from the vicious system which has been overthrown to the democratic constitution with which the Reform Government has 'endowed the Second Chamber ' was -from first to last fiercely resisted; By the Wardißts. Their nominees in--,' the. OounoiL fought the battle of Toryism and autocracy to the last ditch. The members of, the 'Wardist faction in the' House were less.bpen .in their opposition to the reform, but thoir .true sentiments were made'mani-. rest When they voted 'last session against the seoond reading of the Be-' form Bill: Sir Joseph Ward and his party stand arraigned to-day on a twofold charge: , • They maintained the system of Ministerial, patronage, and control under which the Council was degraded by the apppiritment, of none --. but party suppbrters, and many of these men with; no' other; qualification than the size of their, purses, . their contributions to the party funds, -, or their infliienoe as touts for votes. ■ They-resisted:; the; democratic . reform, by ,which the Couuoil has been redeemed from;. its bondage and reconstituted,. upon an elective basis of universal suffrage.. Under, the Ward Government' and its immediate predecessors members of the

I ■ "For ',o« long as'many of our ■ ] prominent politicians can remember we have been promised a reform of,the local government system; -But no Government prior.tq the present one has promised the vital-reform ■ which is embodied in Mr. Massey's ' Bill, the . complete abolition of political and party patronage in the ..distribution of] local grants."—"New Zealand wm 7777,:' 774

Council were,;appointed for,, a' torn of seven years,, and the majority.'.of them iwiformly did what Ministers told them to do, with.little thought .'for the interests- of the .State ;br.the■'•■, will of ,the people. ■'.''.' ;.':■*'""'"; ■';'' Under the Legislative Counoil Aot, whioh was passed this year, after a Parliamentary contest extending over three sessions," members of the Second Chamber will henceforth be /elected on tho universal franchise by a system of proportional representation. The Reform Act gives the Council defined powers equalling those of the House of : Representatives save in respect of money Bills and; the' right, to., ultimately block legislation. '■■'.■.■'"': ..,■'-."■'_ ■■ !'.._, ■ The■ Wardist : Tories: wanted to. retain the old system of nomination and political, patronage; the Democratic Reform Government carried out itSj pledge to trust the people, with the . election of their own representatives.in the Legislative Council. , ,j '.'. .•' The Council Under Wardisrn. ■ The merit of the reform, is best realised by recalling ;■ the conditions under which the Second Chamber waß permitted, by the successive autocraoies of the Continuous Government, .to • exist and do their bidding. Its :.- headlong descent to a status which no self-re-specting road-board;. would consent to share began in 1891, when the Ballanoe Government abolished, !the' system under which members were appointed for life and. substituted appointment for a term of seven years. TThe. effect was, naturally, ; te eliminate any real; semblance of independence. in the majority, of-the'members appointed from that tjme forward, and to 'expose : the ; so-called Upper. House to all the evils of political patronage and control from without. Of ;the opportunities thus opened up the members of the Continuous Ministry-availed themselveß to the fullest possible extent. The membership of the Council was built up and its weakness and servility -Intensified by the Introduction of periodical drafts of obscure nonentities who had render-

[ Sir Joseph Ward lost office, ' as the remit of the general elections of : 1911, became the decided opinion of the country was that his party had lost all public spirit and his policy nil sincerity. —"New Zealand HerI aid." i j

Ed some humble service to their party. Many of these people had neveT been iheara of before they were appointed to the Council,, and moßt of th em have never been heard, of since .except in thoir aggregate effect of reducing the tone and atmosphere of the Counoil to that'of an old men's home. Constituted and degraded in this way the becond Chamber realised- the dearest _ hopes of its Ministerial creators by e'vingthem absolutely no trouble at aIL The bulk of Hb members feared nothing so much, as the loss of their privileges and £200 a year, and never dreamed- of attempting anything !that would place such in jeopardy.. In a word the Legislative Council of New Zealand came to be regarded with contempt. Moek and Lowly Servitors. Sir John Findlay, who earned the office of Leader of the Council by being rejected as a candidate ■ for Wellington City and iigualised his retirement by suffering a similar fate three years ago in Parnell,' stated the position to his fellow-members in- terms that wero direct. to the point of insult. In his first session he informed the Council that "in a certain sense Bills must bo taken oh trust." The Legislature should bavo confidence in' thou-' experts.; It was not to be suggested that every member of the Council should regard it as his duty to master the principles and details of overy Bill—that would bo impossible. It must be'confessed that the majority of the members of the Council accepted ,this advice unreservedly. They

THE ELECTIVE UPPER HOUSE WARDISM ON TRIAL ITS FIGHT AGAINST DEMOCRACY v AUTOCRACY DEFEATED

took praotically everything on trust and, as one of their own number remarked prior to last election, threequarters .of them were afraid to have minds of th'oir own until they found out what the Government wanted. Their ruling principle was to find out what the Government wanted and give it. This meant,:of course, that the Second -, Chamber might just as well not have existed at all, although it. must be said for.it that it did oocasicnally dot an "i" or cross a "t," by way of improving the slipshod legislation which so frequently emergedfrom the Lower Chamber. Any serious attempt to scrutinise or check the Government's output of legislation wae a.thing unheard of.. When the Worm Turned. Even the: worm will turn, ; and the Council,'. under the Continuous Government, did. on one occasion make a feeble attempt to assert its dignity, but the attempt served only to demonstrate; the tightness of its. bonds.. The Imperial Government sent out invitations, to of the , Council to attend King George's Coronation. The Ward Cabinet, for some reason or other, decided that Councillors, should not be allowed to. go to London .and calmly suppressed the invitations which : the,lmperial Government had asked' it to deliver. The humblest citizen in the land would objeot to his invitations being intercepted and even the Legislative Council thought for a little while of objecting, but only to hastily abandon the intention when its Ministerial taskmasters cracked their whips. One member (Mr. Mills) gave notice of, a motion censuring the Attorney-General (Sir John, Findlay) for his flat refusal to give any information about, the invitations. , - When the motion appeared on the Order Paper nest day all wordß protesting against Sir John Findlay's high-handed action had been out out. Instead of rising up to assert its privileges as. a-Chamber of the Legislature the Council 1 meekly Bwallowed the insult, watered down the remnants of the motion to a mild request for information (which was never supplied), and relapsed, into slumber.'; ; Not Fit to Receive Letters. Thus it was established that the Legislative Council, under the Wardist rule, was the: servile butt of the Government not even entitled to receive its own/ correspondence unless the autocrats of the Cabinet thought fit. A parallel for this state of tiitetage must be sought in infant schools and' mental hospitals. ,-■' Did Not Want to be Reformed. Appropriately, enough the dying kick of this ■ poor/i feieble,,;: CabineWomiriated.; Council: was reserved for the great reform which has since lifted it out of miserable servitude and made it fit to exist ;in • a self-governing democracy. Faithful to their departed taskmasters and blind and deaf to the olaims of democratic reform,: the Wardist nominees in the Council battled 'frantically, session after session, for the retention of 'servility at £200 a year, and it was only _when, the Government created a majority by appointing now members that'the opposition to their reform was finally smashed. The successive steps by which the reform was : accomphohed are of too, recent date to call for' recapitulation. Under the Act as it was passed, 24 members of the; Council will be elected in 1917 and the whole forty at the following election six years later.' After 1916 the power-of filling casual vacancies will rest not, with .the Government but with the Council itself. The Last Efforts of the Nominees. The Wardista have lamely insinuated that the Government -has attempted to postpone, the operation of its own Act in order to.profit by the remaining term of the nominative; system. The tiuth is that the Wardist nominees in the Council, who fought so desperately against the reform,' are wholly and solely responsible for the fact that the first election will 1 not take place in 1914, but three yeare later. The Government has done everything in its power to Shorten the remaining iife of the nominative Bvstem. The Wardists have done everything in their power to extend it. Paced by the necessity of appointing new members to the Council in order to. bear down the reactionary bpposi-' tion of the Wardist nominees, the Government in October, 1912;' brought down a Bill which reduced the term of appointment from seven years'to three years. This being done, the Government could still have obtained' its majority and brought the elective system into force at, the present election. The Bill was passed by the House, but the Wardist henchmen in the Council threw it out. Being thus reluctantly" constrained to concede a further brief span to the nominative system) ; the Government, has departed" from the. high Tory traditions; and. methods of the Wardist" Party,' and its predecessors by appointing or reappointing no fewer than six-, straightout opponents to the Second' Chamber. l On no occasion did the Wardists appoint an opponent to: the Legislative Council: The Massey Government, in its short term of office, appointed six of its opponents to the Upper House. The essential point to bear in mind is that the. Wardist nominees In the Council who tried In vain to stem the progress of this great constitutional reform are wholly and solely: responsible for the fact that' ita ! full operationhaa been postponed for three years. Some Tory "pemoorals." It only remains to add that'the seoond reading of the Reform Bill in the House of Representatives was opposed by the following alleged democrats:— '.Atmoro Seddon •■ Buxton • Witty . Ell Hanan Forbes M'Callum Glover Veitch < Mao Donald Brown M'Kenzie Thomson, J. C. Ngata Hindmareh Payne Colvin Rangihiroa Smith, R. W. Robertson Isitt ' Russell Carroll, Sir Jag. Sir Joseph Ward, it is interesting to note, was conveniently absent, and so did not vote either way. THESE ARE THE MEN WHO VOTED FOR MINISTERIAL AUTOCRACY AND ACAINST THE RICHT OF THE PEOPLE TO ELECT THEIR PARLIAMENTARY REPRESENTATIVES. ELECTORS WILL NO DOUBT TAKE NOTE OF THESE NAMES FOR POLLINC PAY. . If the war had broken out in 1912 it i 3 impossible to imagine the trouble that would have been caused in New Zealand.—Nelson "Mail's" opinion o, Wardist rule.

"Liberals" are the only friends thereof:—