WELLINGTON TOPICS

Hokitika Guardian, 19 September 1929, Page 5

WELLINGTON TOPICS

“JOY IUDES.” MEMBER OF PARLIAAIENT PROTESTS. (Special Correspondent.) WELLINGTON, September 17. ■N. In,.his second term of Parliament, Mr Id. S. S. Kyle, the Reform member for Kiccarton, is finding his voice and making it heard. During his first term he was content to listen and think with an occasional interjection and a weekly question to the Alinister of Agriculture. To-day all this is changed. The member -for Kiccarton bears his part in the House to-day with, all the sang froid of the experienced politicians and presents as good a figure as do his predecessors of a decade or more. “There is an amount of joy-riding going on which should be stopped,” he told the chairman of Committee the other day, when the Estimates covering the txpeuses of Government officers sent' abroad were passing under review. Being reminded that the expenses were not incurred bv the present Government, be suppressed a half-spoken exclamation to tell tlie interjector lie did not care a straw who was to blame, He wanted the waste of money stopped.

THE TOTALISATOR, It would seem from a casual counting of heads that the proposal to extend the provisions of the Gaming Act to the length of permitting'the transmission of totalisator investments, to the racecourse and the publication of dividends is not finding the favour it was expected to do with members of Parliament. Of course the Bill ip which the proposal is embodied is not a party measure in any way, though it has the approval of several members of the Cabinet and of other prominent figures in the House and Council. There would be, it is said, no great difficulty in obtaining permission to publish the dividends. These already are made common property on the racecourse and are distributed within a few minutes to every centre of importance within the Dominion. There is nothing to be gained by pretending to keep them secret. But the acceptance of investments by telegraph is another matter. Here, it would seem, a majority oif members are not inclined to risk a disagreement with their constituents.

“WHEN AN ELECTION COAIES.” The Right Hon. J. G. Coates, the -leader of the Opposition, said quite the customary things at the opening of the new rooms of the Political Reform League in Auckland, but he did not say them in just the happiest way. He was scarcely correct in declaring a truce had been “ agreed to ” between the Uniteds and the Reformers during the short session in December “in. order that the Government might have an opportunity to give legislative effect to its election pledges.” Such a truce was suggested, very frankly, by the leader of the Opposition, but the' suggestion was not accepted by the leader of the new Government, who previously had implied that an arrangement of the kind could not be accepted by the United Party. Mr Coates’s- claim that the accumulated surpluses of previous years relieved the Reform Government of responsibility for the deficit last year can hardly he accepted as a serious contention. On the same principle Sir Joseph Ward might snap his fingers at deficits for all time. NOT AN INDEPENDENT.

At r the week-end it was widely announced that Mr J. S. Fletcher, the member for Grey Lynn, had shaken from his .feet his alliance to the United Party and was about to walk across the floor of the House as an “ Independent ” for the present and a potential Reformer in the near future. With the Saturday and Sunday intervening the story obtained a substantial start, and occasioned much satisfaction in various quarters. On Monday, however, Mr Fletcher declared there was not tlie slightest truth in the story. “ The main consideration in my mind is the present relief of unemployment,” he added, “ and I am determined to use every endeavour to help the Government to arrive at an early solution. An attempt at this must be made by the Government and made quickly.” Needless to say,' Mr Fletcher . received many telegrams congratulating him upon his “ walk across the House.” but meanwhile the occasion has proved inopportune and doubtless many of the senders are lamenting. Meanwhile, however, the unemployed remain.