CAVERSHAM ELECTION.

Evening Star, Issue 2956, 9 August 1872, Page 2

CAVERSHAM ELECTION.

Air Fish addressed a crowded meeting of the electors of Caversham at the drill shed there last night. Air Reid was voted to the chair.

Mr Fish premised his remarks % expressing his regret that' ill-health should have caused Mr Cantrell’s resignation. Had a local man come forward he (Mr Fish) would have felt it his duty not to have entered upon the election; but the enquiries he instituted previous to announcing his candidature led him to believe that no good local man would come forward; he therefore thought he had just as much right to ask their suffrages as any other candidates. It was due to himself that he should notice a few remarks made by Mr Stout at the nomination. Mr Stout had attributed to him an attempt to raise religious dissensions during thee ontest; but that gentleman himself had c"eated a “ bogie man,” for the purpose of having a shy at him, and knocking him down. He did not think Mr Stout had impressed them with the idea that he (Mr Fish) had been canvassing on the religious ticket, and though there were many in the room, he did not think anyone would say he had made any attempts in that direction. He cited from Mr Stout’s speech to show that that gentleman was the first to introduce questions of a personal nature. Turning to the topics of discussion, he said be was of opinion that it would be a very distant date indeed when Provincial institutions would bs entirely abolished. It was clear tiiat so long as the Government of the country must chieily be conducted from some centre in the Colony they must have either Provincial Councils or some other local body to administer the laws locally. Whether it be under the name and form of Provincial Councils or not, it was not an important matter to consider j but he felt certain that to abolish

Provincial institutions without substituting something else equally good, would be prejudicial to the prosperity of the Provinces, lie was in favor of curtailing the pompousness of Provincial Councils—of curtailing a great deal of that show and mimicry of Parliament—that imitation of the powers that be—and that they could do with something less formidable than Mr Speaker, and with less of the paraphernalia connected with the present administration of Provincial Council affairs. He would also support a redaction of the number of Provincial Councillors, and of the simplitication of the modus operandi of Councils ; and thought the General Assembly should at once, definitely and permanently, fix what Provincial Councils could do and what they could not. He also thought a limitation of the present powers of Provincial Councils could be effected with good to the community. On the subject of education, he expressed the opinion that the system at present in vogue in this Province had worked exceedingly well. If there was to be a change in the system of educating the youth of the Province, he hoped to see the continuance of the Bible reading in the public schools. He was opposed to anything in the shape of denominationali'in ; and although he did not see any object’on to Bible reading, i£ the effect of that leading was to create ill-feeling amongst the various religions sects, he said eliminate Bible reading altogether from our schools. (Applause). Religious teaching should be properly left t» the priests of the various denominations and to the parents of the children. He was inclined to think the people of this Province were running riot on this education question. He would support to the utmost assistance being given by the State to aid schools ; he was prepared to go further and say that the education of the young should be made compulsory ; but if compulsory education was to be enforced, that education must be free—there should be no school fees charged. While he supported the aiding of schools by the State largely and liberally, that aid should cease with the common and grammar schools. It was not the duty of the State to pay large sums of money or to make large endowments of land for the support of high-class education. While he admitted and approved of everybody in the place being educated in the highest degree—classically and otherwise—he said that if parents required their children to have a higher education than was furnished by the elementary and grammar schools, the expense should fall on the persons who received that higher education.— (Applause.) Elementary education concerned the bulk of the community ; higher education did not. Therefore he held it to be wrong to spend so much money in support of the Otago University. Many of the students were well able to afford the higher fees required to make that institution nearly self - supporting. But he favored the State founding a number of scholarships whieh might be founded in connexion with any of the educational institutions of the country. He approved of special settlements, and in regard to the land question, opposed the sale of land in large blocks to the capitalists as being prejudicial to the best interests of the Province ; and tended to obstruct settlement. There was a new opinion springing up in regard to the land question. Some persons, and many of them deep thinking men, held it to be impolitic to part with the land at all, and he was not prepared to say but that this view was a sound one. With the State as landlord of the people, it had a never failing source of revenue ; and the people would take such care of it as would make it more valuable each year. In making these remarks he did not wish it to be understood that he was committing himself to that opinion. He merely mentioned the new idea that was springing up, and he was not prepared to say but that it was the correct solution of the land question. With regard to public works. He thought the result of handing over their control to the Superintends and their Executives would be disaster and confusion ; but he would not object to the Superintendents becoming the agents of the General Government, which should certainly retain the supreme control of the works. To place a division of the loan in the care of the Provinces to be expended would only to be to continue the petty squabbling and miserable jealousies which existed in the Provinces in times gone by. He held it to be unwise and impolitic on the part of the General Government to part with the control of these works ; at the same time he did not appear before the electors as the apologist of the General Government. Whether they were carrying out their policy correctly or pot was nqt a matter which concerned a candidate for a scat in the Provincial Council. For any direliction of duty they were amenable to Parliament; and if they had committed such our representatives there would take the earliest opportunity of informing them of the fact.

A vote of confidence in Mr Fish was proposed by Mr R. Wilson, seconded by Mr R. Farley, and carried. After the meeting Mr Fish’s supporters met, and the following were constituted, a committee for the Kensington and Caversham subdivision of the district : Messrs T. G. Bellamy, M. Dundou, W, U’Rcn, James Fairlie, Jas. Black, H. Duck • manton, F. Porter, A. Barnes, Thos. Nelson, Win. Reid, R. B. Wilson, F. Wray, W. Halligan, W. R. James, W. Greenwood.