GOLD FIELDS ESSAYS.

Dunstan Times, Issue 380, 30 July 1869, Page 3

GOLD FIELDS ESSAYS.

(Ifanmrd.) The Deputy Speaker said, in reference to tlic motion on the Order Paper standing in the ipsme of the honorable member for Dunedin City, that doubts existed in his mind as to whether the honorable member could make his motion. The question was, to what' extent the majority of the House had power over tho property of the House. If they could dispose of papers they could give away other property besides. It was also a question in his mind whether the Legislative Council had not some indirect interest in the papers of the House, scainS that they could appoint a Committee to search its votes and proceedings. However, ha had not satisfied himself sufficiently on tho point, and would therefore put tho question. Mr. Reynolds was glad that the Deputy Speaker ha i taken that course, as otherwise he (Mr. Reynolds) was afraid he should have had to bring an action against him for retaining in bis possession property which did not belong to him. That would have boon tho only course left to the gentlemen who had sent in essays. Clearly the essays never belonged to (he House, and the Government did wrong in placing them on the table. If the Government were to call for competitive designs for a building or any other public work, the unaccepted designs would lie returned to tire parties who had forwarded them : and, in- like manner, ho held that the unaccepted essays were not tho property of tho Government or of the House. They should either bo returned, or compensation bo given to tho authors. Motion made, r.r.d question proposed,— “ That tho unsuccessful Essays on the Settlement of the Gold Fields be returned to tho writers, on application being made for tho same.”

Mr. Fox said tint it did not appear that tlto point raised by Mi - . Deputy Speaker, in reference to the House not having the right to return those documents, was conclusive. The point, as he understood it, was that the Legislative Council had a right to search the minutes and inspect the docu. incuts belonging to that House. That body might have the right of searching the records in possession of the House, but the House was not thereby precluded from making away with its own property if if saw fit to do so. In ease of a search beingmade, and the required documents not being found, the only answer that could be given would be that they had been returned to the rightful owners. Ho apprehended, however, that, under the peculiar circumstances of tiie case, it was not of much consequence what was done. The rejected Essays were probably not interesting to any pe sons but the authors, and no member of the House was likely to engage in the study of them, and if the authors had a partiality for their own offspring, they should lie allowed to have them. Cut it was a precedent which might be an inconvenient one hereafter, and it ought to bo understood that no precedent was established, but that the decision of the House rested solely on the character of the transaction, as it did not consider that the documents possessed sufficient public interest to make it continue to act as their custo Tan.

Mr. Main opposed: tlib motion, because the time ha! not yet arrived when the documents in question could-be removed from the table of the House. It had been rightly stated by the Deputy Speaker that the Legislative Council had an equal interest with that House in regard to its records, and he must say, for one, that ho had not yet done with the papers Those of them who had at all dived into light literature knew that, before now, rejected addresses had been published, and the time might come When those essays would he valuable. ■Motion agreed to. •