WELLINGTON NOTES,

Hokitika Guardian, 25 April 1919, Page 3

WELLINGTON NOTES,

I -■ j THE NATIONAL GOVERNMENT I PRESENT'AND FUTURE. . I (Our Special Correspondent) WELLINGTON, April 23. ■ Sir James Allen and the Hon. D, H. Guthrie have made it abundantly clear that in their desire for a strong Government to deal with the after-war problems which will crowd upon the country during the next two or three years they regard a National Cabinet ns a necessary part of the political equipment of the Dominion. The ActingPrune Minister is a little more diffident than his colleague is about the matter. He is not quite sure the present Cabinet provides all the essentials of a strong Government. He admits tbe question is open to argument. But given tfle, strength he would not trouble very much, so he says, about tbe colour of the party in the ascendancy. Tbe Minister on tho other hand, thinks nothing could be better than the present arrangement, nothing more conducive towards wise legislation, vigorous administration, and the general welfare of the community. THE ACTING LIBERAL LEADER How far these gentlemen represent tbe views of their absent party chief—if they represent them at all—it would be idle to speculate just now. - It is a matter on which Mr Massey will be able to express himself more freely on his return from London than he coidd before his departure. Meanwhile there is little to be drawn from the Acting leader of the Liberal Party on tbe subject. Mr. MacDonald returned last night from a visit to the Hawke’s Bay district where an accumulation iof departmental .business claimed his attention; and when asked this morning if he had anything to say concerning the political position he thought the subject was scarcely open for discussion, at any rate by those who were committed to the maintenance of tbe party truce during the absence of Mr Massey and Sir Joseph Ward.

THE USEFUL OPPOSITION. But Mr. MacDonald was not disinclined to discuss the political outlook in general terms. He did not claim that the National Cabinet had realised all the high expectations of its friends, but he believed it had the country successfully through an striven with a single purpose to pilot extremely critical stage in its history. Probably it would have done better had it been confronted by a strong Opposition, but of course an Opposition of any sort was foreign to the idea with which it was originally formed. Personally, he believed that Sir Joseph Ward’s scheme for dissociating the war front the general politics of the country would have worked well enough and that tho Government, whi,le having the unanimous support of Parliament on questions of defence, would have had behind it a strong and well organised Opposition.

THE OUTLOOK

The Acting leader of the Liberal Party could say nothing about the intentions of his party chief, but lie was satisfied himself that a large majority of tho electors were taking a much keener interest in politics at the present time that they had done for many years before. They were not likely, ! seeing the inevitable limitation lying | upon the National Cabinet, to look I with a very kindly eye towards “coalition,” which, whatever its advantages in tho way of safety, was not associated in the public mind with the idea i f progress. The old party bitterness, b ■ hoped, was dead for ever, but tho titiw party rivalry, inspired by the; higher ideals created by the war, should do much to shape the destiny of the Do--1 minion along tho same lines that make for justice and comfort and largely ini creased development and production.