WELLINGTON TOPICS

Hokitika Guardian, 5 July 1926, Page 4

WELLINGTON TOPICS

A ONE-SIDED PARLIAMENT. ATTITUDE OF PARTIES. (Special to “ Guardian.”) WELLINGTON, July 2. The Nationalist-Liberal members of tiie House of Representatives repudiate emphatically the suggestion which has been made in certain quarters to the effect that they did not support -Mill. E. Holland’s “ want of confidence ” motion on account of an approaching alliance betwen the two older parties. .M,r G. W. Forbes, the leader of the Nationalist Party, when speaking in the Address-in-Reply debate made the position quite clear. He and liis colleagues, lie said, were not going to asist in wasting the time of the House and the money of the country by hurling hopeless -and purposeless “ nofidenco ” liiotions at the Government. They were soul there to serve a more useful purpose than that. When any great principle! on which the I,a hour and the Nationalist parties ivero agreed was at stake, however, the Nationalist party would throw itsell consistently and whole-heartedly into the fray. This obviously is the sensible attitude in the circumstances. Neither the Labour Party nor the Nationalist Party has the slightest chance of impairing the solidity ol the Reform ranks during the present session, and “want of confidence” motions which merely demonstrate this fact can do nothing to better the fortunes of either section of the Opposition. When the House settles down to serious business, as it, should do next week, progress should lie comparatively smooth, and unusually rapid.

DAIRY CONTROL. The whisper of a few days ago that Cabinet- had decided that the institution of “ absolute control ” he postponed for a further twelve months and that the final decision would lie left to the new dairy board for which the Government’s foreshadowed legislation is to make provision, has assumed the dimensions of a. street-corner story. Significance is attached to the fact that the last three appointments to the Cabinet have strengthened the opposition to compulsion within the inner circle and to- the further tact that the Prime .Minister himself lias lately expressed a desire to see the contending parties in friendly co-operation. It is being assumecd, too, that .Mr Coates would -prefer going to the Imperial Conference without the Dominion being involved in what some of the critics at Home have clubbed a- price raising scheme. The head of the Government, however, has given no indication of his intentions in the matter, and his colleagues, of course, are keeping their own counsel, publicly siding with neither one side nor the other. In the House last night. .Mi' Nash, the member for .Palmerston North, a pronounced free marketer, did not help liis cause to any material extent, but Mr Veitcli. the member for Wanganui, spoke logically and well to 11 10 evident discomfiture of the compulsionists.

Oft DER S-IN-COUNCI L. A lobby canvass of the members of the House this morning—necessarily incomplete, of course—found not more than three of them with as much as a nodding acquaintance with the contents of the Hoard of Trade Amendment Act of 102!!, which invests the Government of flic day with powers which never before in peace time had been exercised without the direct authority of Parliament. These- powers enable the Government at its own utterly unrestrained will to suppress methods of competition, trading or business; to prevent monopolies and combinations in regard to any industry; to lix maximum or minimum prices or rates for any class ol goods or services, and to regulate and control in any other manner whatever which is deemed necessary lor the maintenance and prosperity of those industries and the economic welfare of New Zealand. Two high legal authorities speak lug with deliberation state positively that in no other of the belligerent countries was war legislation of this description -allowed to remain in force beyond a strictly limited and well-de-fined period. As a- matter ol fact, the Hoard of Trade Amendment Act is not war legislation at all. It was- passed live years after the conclusion of the war. and yet gives to the Government inquisitorial and arbitrary powers which the Government had surrendered four rears before! CRICKET.

The prbpsnl to semi a New Zealand < lii lcot team to England next year, as announced by the Cricket Council, seems to have been received with very general approval here. The good showing made by the New Zealand cricketers in Australia last season has encouraged the idea that the time, has arrived for the Dominion’s players to take {heir courage in both bands and obtain still further experience on the cricket fields of the Mother Country. .Mr IT. AleGirr, one of the best known and most consistent of Wellington representative > players, emphasises very chivalrously the educative value of such a trip as the one that is being contemplated. “ The education of young players, able to pass on their acquired knowledge to their contemporaries,” be said to-day, “ should be the aim ol the selectors. The fact that a man has iplayed' good cricket for twenty or thirty years should not alone earn him a place in the team. Get us stretch a point in favour of the young man, with natural | gifts, the right temperament p.nd grit. TTis value as a prospective. teacher is even greater than his immediate value as a match winner.” This is the policy to lie held ill view by the Cricket Concii. Without professionalising its cricket New Zealand could add materially to its quality and so give an additional fiillip to the best of all British games.