THE Kaipara Advertiser, AND WAITEMATA CHRONICLE. WEDNESDAY, NOV 27, 1912.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 27 November 1912, Page 2

THE Kaipara Advertiser, AND WAITEMATA CHRONICLE. WEDNESDAY, NOV 27, 1912.

MINISTERS ON TOUR. MINISTERS do not now remeber their diatribes of the Opposition days against the " junketings " of the Government. Neither does any one expect them to. They have the right to do what their predecessors did, because what their predecessors did was right. Their abuse of them for doing right was but the usual game. Moreover the long period of wandering in the wilderness lather destroyed the sense of fitness of things which is never a strong point of Opposition. On the whole no one thinks much of those diatribes ; indeed, happily, our politics are above that sort of thing. Ministers are not, of course, content with merely going about, they detail their various successes after the manner of ministers' in general. They have some ri^ht, because they are admitted to ha/ye done well in spite of the short n.otice they got before taking offic-e. They have had the moral courage to do most of tne things left by their predecessors. Had they done otherwise it would • have ' been a very poor lookout fox our

politics. But this is a fractional admission that much of good is to be found in all policies of parties, much that is in common between them. The Land Bill stands at the head of the ministerial achievment and the Legislative Council at the tail of ministerial failure. The last need not be regretted because there is plenty of time to think out a subject which as billed had not been thought out. The first is cause for hope rather than rejoicing. It is an honest attempt to open the closed lands, and the least we can do is to wait for the events of its train. If these are good then it will be good to let well alone ; if they is otherwise, then there will be a case for the amendment of the measure. Mr Herries, who is the most practical man on the Ministerial benches, voiced their best cause for congratulation, when he painted the utter demoralisation of the scattered fragments of the old Liberal Party. So far as the most experienced sight extends there is nothing to encourage the belief that this disorganisation and discouragement are near their end. There is no need why they should end before next election than before the Day of Judgment. The Liberals are small in mind for the most, and Labour is getting more and more disunited every day.