POLITICAL POINTS.

Greymouth Evening Star, Volume XXXI, 31 July 1901, Page 3

POLITICAL POINTS.

* Mr Graham on the Lands for 'Settlement Bill.-—“ The Premier did not give more information about the Bill than the House expected.” The Premier —I can't give them more than they understand.” “Since listening to the speech of the hon. member who has just sat down I am hot sure what the House is discussing” —Mr Graham’s tribute to Mr Barclay. “I know a settler's wife on the West Coast who had to cross a river in hood four times, swimming it three times, and ■bp came through all that to vote for ms.”—A modest anecdote by the Premier, which raised a chorus of “OhV of admiration. Mr Ell is not very complimentary to the Premier's election organisations. He states that in Christchurch they spring into life two months before an election and die immediately afterwards. It is, Mr £ll says, the active workers and the temperance party who carry through reforms such as the Old Age Pension Act.

Mr Baddo opposes local loans on principle. Ha admits that there is uninvested money in the colony, but it is not of any great extent, and if local loans are frequently resorted to, the operation will soon be reflected in the local money market, and farmers and others requiring “ loans will hare to pay higher charges. “ Freehold has been the curse of this colony,*' said Mr Napier. Ho added that it hadienabled money-lenders and usurers to fatten on the people. Another member! “And lawyers." Mr Napier—--44 Lawyers, of course.” Iff Oamoross regards the electrical righto system of voting as being likely to aplik up and defeat the Liberal party. “ Swiss Milk Settlement ” is Me Felix M'Quirs’s quaint soubriquet for an arid district within bis k«n. Of course, it is unnecessary to explain that the country was so poor that the genuine lacteal fluid was an extreme rarity.