STILL WAITING

Hokitika Guardian, 6 September 1927, Page 4

STILL WAITING

(Lyttelton Times). Parliament is now in the third month of the present session, and the big tasks have not been begun. And unless the sittings are to lie continued far beyond the usual time, more progress will have to be made, or the country will have a repetition of the unseemly rush of legislation witnessed in tb.e dying hours of the session last jear. Consideration of tho many items of the new tariff will take a long time, and in addition, there are the important Railways and Public Works Statements to be presented and discussed, and probably more important still, the Governments proposals with regard to the extension of rural credits. Last week a commencement was made with the Estimates, hut apparently the day has gone when these important financial matters get the close sciutinv which the state of the Dominion fully warrants. On Friday afternoon votes aggregating £805,047 were passed'at a sitting, and, of these, items totalling £628,428 were passed without discussion. In the evening, Departmental' Votes accounting lor another £351,813 were passed, so that in the afternoon and evening the House disposed of Estimates aggregating £1,156,860. The day seems to he approaching, if not. indeed already here, when members of the party in power will take little or in part in the work of considering the Estimates. Yet that task should not lie left to those in opposition. There are aspects of public life and public duty tbar arc above party loyalty. It is becoming generally realised that there is small hope of reuced taxation unVess something is done to curb the surprising ability of this Administration to spend money. Year alter year the Minister of Finance says that the outlook does not warrant any reduction, and year after year more is taken from the taxpayers than is required to’meet commitments. Of recent years huge sums have been taken from surplus taxation and used to reduce indebtedness, in addition to the provisions made annually to comply with the Statutes. The country has been passing through a. period of depression, but tho Government lias done nothing to assist by lessening the burden of taxation. Tlie taxable capacity must have fallen so that taxation presses the more heavily. The most practical way to obtain relief is to reduce expenditure, and it is the duty of members irrespective of party, to assist to that end. But, whatever may be the duty, the fact is that sums running into hundreds of thousands of pounds are being passed without discussion, and largesums after only the most cursory do-

bate. During the consideration of the vote of £315,403 for the Department of Internal Affairs, two members of the Reform Party did venture to speak. One confined his remarks to red deer, wapiti and opossums, and the other dealt with opossoms only. It is a striking fact that the House lias devoted more time to discussing the Summer Time Bii'l than it lias to financial matters relating to over i 11.000,000 of expenditure. It Ims been in session for over ten weeks, and as yet the record is pitifully bare. True, there has been passed a measure enabling the Government to deport white residents of the group form Western Samoa, without trial or any definite charge, and last week legislation was introduced which must increase the burden of taxation of all taxpayers in receipt of a moderate- income. Items : such as these could never be held to j justify the record of the . session to J date.

Important measures have been promised, but they are being kept in tlie background. And the danger is that they will he presented during the last singes of the session and rushed through without due consideration. The country has had experience of that procedure in the past, and is more than tired of it. The truth of the mattei is that the Government lacks initiative. It appears content to limit its scope to the smaller things, and there is a feeling that it lacks the capacity for the larger tasks. Industrialists are anxiously awaiting the introduction of the new tariff, motorists have had a hint that they are to he taxed more heavily, and farmers have heen promised- a scheme of rural credits which is to ease their burdens. But. after ten weeks of Parliament in session, that is as far as we have got. And the country is waiting, and waiting anxiously, for the measures which Mr Coates said were to overcome tne existing difficulties “with the utmost satisfaction to all the people of the Dominion.” Waiting is a ' tiresome I business, ~