The Evening Star TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1872.

Evening Star, Issue 2995, 24 September 1872, Page 2

The Evening Star TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1872.

Mr Stafford’s Ministry, even should they succeed in maintaining their seats through the session, will not find their position an easy one. It may be safely affirmed that their difficulties will be indefinitely increased, because their supporters are the least intelligent portion of the House, and consequently the most grasping and dissatisfied. On examining the Order Papers, which, like those of our own Provincial Council, bristle with points that need resolving, we find several that are very likely to be embarrassing. We may especially mention Mr Taiaroa’s motions. We look with some apprehension at this evidence of activity regarding Maori matters, for we cannot but recall to mind the terrible muddle into which Mr Stafford’s Native policy once plunged the Colony. It is perfectly true that when a Maori becomes a member of the House of Representatives he has the right that belongs to every member to introduce such measures as in his judgment are for the benefit of the Colony. He is acting in a perfectly constitutional manner; but when the representative of a race rouses himself from passive to active effort immediately after a change in the Executive, two doubts at once suggest themselves : he is either attempting to make a tool of the Ministry, or they are making a tool of him. In either case there is danger. The time has gone past when the Natives can be satisfied with baubles, and therefore it will be necessary to watch keenly what is to be the price of their support. Our Colonial Walpole seems early at his tricks again. Mr Taiaroa, on the 19th September, had four notices on the paper: the first and last form a covert way of obtaining evidence against the late Ministry, whose successful administration of Native affairs was so strong an argument against their being unseated. One was a motion for a Select Committee to inquire into the unfulfilled promises to the Ngaitahu. What those promises were, by whom made, or whether they

ever were made at all, does not appear from the terms of the motion. We suppose we must wait for Hansard or the press on that point. Next he obtained leave to introduce “a Bill to provide for the Constitution of a Native Council for the Middle Island.” It will be remembered that last year a resolution passed the House sanctioning vaguely some such step. What powers will be claimed for such a Council, what object is to be gained by it, and how it is to be constituted, whether or not it is to be an imperinm in imperio, will not only be matters of curiosity, but will be required to be carefully considered both by the Legislature and the constituencies. It is plain, however, that the Government intend throwing the responsibility and odium of the rejection of the measure upon the Opposition if they can. His third successful move was for the appointment of a committee to inquire into and report upon certain alleged unfulfilled promises to Natives in the Middle Island. Mr (Stafford is wise in his generation, always supposing that he succeeds in rushing through his estimates and bringing the session to a close before any action can be taken in these mat ters. Committees of Enquiry fill up time, and throw responsibilities upon other shoulders than the Executive. Unless there be documentaiy evidence to prove the promises, a vast sifting of oral evidence, pro and con , will have to be undergone concerning them, if they were ever made. Then the question will be, by whose authority were they made, for what purpose; and, lastly, have the Natives put their own interpretation upon them, and that a false one. But though Mr Taiaroa has succeeded in three points which could not be marked “ dangerous,” he did pin Mr Stafford into a corner on a fourth. He moved that “ This House will, on Wednesday next (to-morrow), resolve itself into a Committee of the whole, to consider an Address to His Excellency the Governor, requesting that he will cause to be placed upon the Estimates the sum of £SOO, for the construction of a road from Portobello to Otago Heads.” This was more than Mr Stafford appeal’s to have bargained for. In the remarks he is reported to have made, he evidently considers that what the Government have always done at the Colonial expense for the North Island, without charging upon the Provinces benefited, must be done at the cost of the Provinces of the Middle Island. We wish to know why this difference ? If the North Island is to have work done towards which the Middle Island contributes, is it not fair that a similar class of work shall be done in the Middle Island, the North Island contributing 1 Mr Stafford was right when he said, “it opened up a very large question.” It opens up a much larger question than suits The Stafford Ministry to deal with. It opens up the question of Financial Separation, and localisation of expenditure, and, we trust, in that light all the Middle Island members will regard it. We do not see the justice of one law for the North and another for the Middle Island—of the General Government doing for the North what Provincial Governments are required to do in the South, Mr Stafford must take care that he is not “ hoist with his own petard.”