The Lyttelton Times. Wednesday, August 30, 1854.

Lyttelton Times, Volume IV, Issue 191, 30 August 1854, Page 2

The Lyttelton Times. Wednesday, August 30, 1854.

We are now in a position to state distinctly the reasons of the ex-Ministry for their resignation. The attacks made by Mr. E. G. Wakefield upon them have recoiled signally upon himself, and the debates that enaued have at least had this good effect—that they have opened the eyes of the House and of the Public to the true author of the present difficulties, and compelled him to appear in his own character. Until a few days before their resignation Mr. Fitz Gerald and his colleagues carried on the necessary legislation with large majorities. Bu-j they soon found that the state of public affairs was such as to render it impossible to carry on a Government much longer unless the offices were put into the hands of men capable of business and possessing the confidence of the people. All the Government offices were found to be in a state of the greatest confusion. The Land Department, the outstanding unsettled land claims, the public debts, the issue of scrip, all exposed a system of incompetence and illegality. The statement of public accounts made by His Excellency in his opening speech was wrong by £40,000 or £50,000. Well may the " Southern Cross" ask who was the author of that statement. If the late ministry had done nothing else, they Ffave conferred a great boon on the country by dragging these enormities to light. The publication by them of the accounts since .the date of the expiration of the last Appropriation bill—nearly a year ago, brought matters to a crisis. Their supporters gave them to understand that they would not pass the estimates unless a permanent Government were formed with such guarantees given as would prevent the occurrence of such gross misgovernment for the future. As we stated last week the Ministry took office on the distinct that " as soon as the public service required it,'' and so soon as the bill was passed granting pensions to the retiring officers, they were to resign, and a permanent Responsible Government was to be formed. This was the understanding, on the faith of which the Ministers had proposed, and the House accepted, the arrangement. But when the Ministry found that the lime had

arrived when it was necessary for them to be able to state to the House that a permanent Government would be established as soon as the " m Executive Government Bill had passed, and when they advised accordingly, they were met by an actual breach of agreement, amounting to treachery. The Attorney-General and Treasurer " would only resign to the Crown in England." This is contrary to the advice given by the same Attorney-General in his memorandum to the Governor on the subject of Responsible Government. He promised to resign " when the public service required it;" but mentally reserved his right to advise His Excellency not to ask him to resign! The real intention of these gentlemen appears to haye been to get the Responsible advisers to work through the Session for them, and then to go on just as before. The result of all this was the resignation. Now as to the conduct of Mr. Edward Gibbon Wakefield. He has outdone all that was ever expected of him —and that was not a little—in a career of shameless political profligacy. From the first he, supported in everything by his son, covertly and insidiously under the pretence of friendship began an attack upon the Ministry, and that in the very face of those promises of support which had been but just uttered, and by which they were partly induced totakeoffi.ee. But all his sacrifices of truth and consistency were in vain. He was always signally defeated. In vain he foreswore every opinion he had ever written or spoken in the course of a long life—in vain he stated that he, the originator of the theory, and one of the proposers of the Canterbury scheme, had never wished to have high price in New Zealand—in vain he again attempted to get up a popular delusion by the cry of cheap land for working settlers. Nobody believed him—he could not muster a decent following—he foreswore his creed in vain—this last must be to him a cruel consideration. He promised that he would support a measure advocating the Provincial management of the Waste Lands; but on the introduction of a Bill to give effect to such management, he opposed it bitterly, stating his conviction that the Provincial Councils Avould job away the Crown Lands. But we cannot trace his progress step by step as he was preparing himself for his master-stroke of baseness and treachery. When his Excellency sent for him on the resignation of the Ministry, he took part with the irresponsible advisers against the house, against Responsible Government, against his own so recently and emphatically declared opinions. Responsible Government would have been won and secured by the resignation of the Ministry but for the ratting of the man who claimed to be its author and protector in New Zealand. His Excellency will have but little reason to congratulate himself upon his temporary connection with Mr. Wakefield. Here in New Zealand, as many a time before in England, his old friends can work with him no longer. Mr. Sewell is compelled to break with him altcgether, and has proved more than a match for him in debate. Like all others his present supporters will fall away after a little further experience of him. Up to the last date from Auckland tlie house was firm in its support of the policy of the ex-Minis try, who had resigned for the same cause for which they took office—Responsible Government.

The documents which have been published relative to the Resignation of the Ministry are of great interest. But as they could not be published at once in. a complete form, we preferred to giye them all in Saturday's paper, to publishing them piecemeal; in order that the public may be able to form their own opinion upon the subject of present difficulties.