WELLINGTON TOPICS

Hokitika Guardian, 5 June 1929, Page 7

WELLINGTON TOPICS

J uVEXILE DELINQUENTS. DIFFICULT PROBLEMS. (Special Correspondent.) WELLINGTON. May 30. In the course of an address delivered at the annual meeting of tin Howard League of Penal Reform, Mr J. S. Barton, one of llie stipendiary magistrates stationed in Wellington, gave it as his opinion that the court proceedings in the case of child delinquents were too rigid. The court procedure was admirably designed to meet the ease of the normal child delinquent, and meet it well; but it was not equally well designed to mtv; liie case of tile more serious offender. In trivial by-law casts there was to. much interference and in more serious cases there was not enough. Laus or sixteen or so who had anti-society tendencies and dishonest habits might snap their fingers at tlje authorities in the knowledge that they could not he corporally handled. As a result, the magistrate declared, hoys of this type in considerable numbers wen missing the disciplinary treatment which probably would arrest them in their downward course.

POLITICIANS’ PAY. The new National Government in Queensland having announced Ps intention to cut down the pay of members of Parliament from £750 a year to £SOO, the “Dominion” is early in the field with a hint to Sir Joseph Ward that an increase- of the salaries of members of the New Zealand House of Representatives from £450 to £6OO a year would not be acceptable to the taxpayers who would have to provide the additional money. The morning paper implies that the average member of the House is paid a:much as he is worth. “The most pressing argument, however, against any increase of costs at the present time,’ 5 it says, “is the state of the country’s finances. The country already is restless'' under its load of taxation, and further" perturbed by prospective changes which mean added burdens in sonic' form or another.' In these circumstances no section of the House will feel inclined to clamour for more pay.

prime Minister's tour. - i - -i ;ii" > Sir Joseph Ward returned from his southern trip yesterday a little wearied by the travelling and talking' demanded from hjpi during the last fortnight, but much’gratified by the cordiality extended to him everywhere, and ‘by the material progress he had noticed in many districts he had not previously visited for some yea vs. He had not been out on an electioneering campaign—indeed- party politics had been dropped altogether for the time being—and when he came to think of it he could not say which of the many new friends he had made were his supporters and which his opponents. At any rate he felt very tnueli at home among them. He had during bis trip travelled over a, good deal of the country that would he affected by the railway works now in contemplation. He did not wish to, discuss this subject at the moment, hut lie suggested that his critics might do, Worse than.jaakc a similar inspection.

THE RAILWAY PROBLEM. At the moment the discussion of the Prime Minister’s railway construction proposals appears t,o be resolving itself into a controversy between the Not th Island and the South. - This morning the “Dominion,” describing the “Auckland Star” as “one of the staunchest and most influential of Sir Joseph Ward’s newspapers supporters,” quotes largely from an editorial in that journal in which Sir Joseph Ward is advised to move warily in committing himself to further railway construction. But it seems, a f ter all that it is only, sound advice that is being offered to Sir Joseph “Though the estimated cost is moderate,” says the “Star,” “the ultimate expenditure may prove to bo much heavier than is now contemplated, and, on the whole, we think the Prime Minister and the Minister of Railways " ill bo well advifeed to collect further information on those points before any decisive step is taken.” Surely the staunches! or friends may say as much as this without disparagement.