Mr J. G. Wilson's Speech on the Financial Debate.

Manawatu Herald, Volume III, Issue III, 21 July 1891, Page 2

Mr J. G. Wilson's Speech on the Financial Debate.

(Continued.) I may say, £-3t of all, however, that when the Minister himself came to Palmerston, he was interviewed fey .the members, of the Chamber of Commerce, who felt rather sore at being asked who were the members who had passed that resolution;- but at any rate, they said they were quite prepared to give the names if they were wanted. The Minister said in Very plain terms to the deputation who waited on him, — " I will tell you what I meant by asking for the names of the members of the Chamber. I have been informed privately that the Chamber passed these resolutions because a number of the members were-* members of the Birmingham Special Settlement, and had not complied with the regulations." Now, Chambers of Commerce have a recognised status all the world over, and the Minister had no right to. question them in thfct way. I could not ;help agreeing with Mr Spence, in his now celebrated speech that " the chief adviser of the Government was tittle-tattle." . I made special enquiry after this statement of the Minister's, and, as these people felt very much annoyed at the imputation cast upon them, I wrote to the secretary, and got from him a list of the names of the members who attended .the particular meeting to which I have referred, and who passed that resolution. I have the list here, as I say, but there is no use in troubling the Hbuse with the names. • The House, however, may accept my assurance that, as the result of my .inquiries, I found that not a single individual among ' those members was connected with the BirminghanvSettlement except the chairman of the meeting, Mr Hawkins, a local solicitor who drew their memorandum of Association. Now, I think it very improper of a Minister, to -take- the- opinions of outside and irresponsible persons, and .listen io mis-statements against respectable individuals., I must say that it is hardly in consonance with the position of a, Minister to listen to, the tittle' tattles, bf outside people on qi^efc* tidris of tnatfsort. However, having stated the facts in connection with this matter, and expressed my opinion on it, I shall £as 9 on irpm tb^at subject. ' I come now to' that pdint in the Financial Statement in which the Premier says that he has not disturbed the distinction which has been 'made between the territorial revenue and the Land Fund, 'thbugh' he can hardly see any reaspp for its continuance; I bahnot' agree with him oh this pdint. These two funds should be kept quite separate. One.is oiir incbnie and. the other our : ciipital. : It seems' to me,! at least, very unfortunate to take our revenue from borrowed money. Supposing you had to purchase Native lands. You purchase these lands'out of borrowed money. You have also to spend a considerable amount of borrowed money in roading these lands and preparing them for settlement. Then, supposing you sell the land, whafil is the result ? The . result would simply be that you would pay the, money - the . proceeds of . the land sales— into the consolidated revenue, or, in other words, you would pay in what has been paid iqx by 'borrowed! money ; and that is fiv-i Ing ipon borrowed money . I : think that: from my point cf view at any ratej that would be a very improper things ,No doubt to some exteni we Eavedohe it in the past, but we have paid the proceeds back to ' the Land Fund, and not paid' them into general ievenue; J. think. ; With re.gardrfc© the proposal to levy a tax up.on the tptalisator, I cannot say, i that I am altogether against a tax of that sort.:, I have heard a great nnmber ,of people say that it is a very wrong things to derive a revenue from gamblipg,;but Ido not regard it in that light. It seems to me that we cannot make people dispense altogether with some sort of indulgence of this kind, but what we must allow them to gamble in some way.' We must be prepared to afford them opportunities for some amusemejnt, and in this country there is so little amusement that, we should be careful not to restrict it unduly. It is quite clear tEai they will have gambling in some form, and our duty should be, while recognising that desire, to so regulate it that it shall be carried on in the best way possible, and I think gamling through the totalisator is the best and fairest form we can have. Ido not use it much myself, still I belong to a racing club, and I believe the Imposition of thisltax will make it very difficult for these : clubs — country, ones especially — to struggle along with any hope of being able to carry out their objects satisfactorily to themselves. I think that the; amount of the tax ought to be lowered. ; I regard 2£ per. cent as a. very large tax indeed and : if it were, reduced it would be much more satisfactory to those concerned. I do not agree with : the honourable member for Egmontj who says he thinks the revenue raised by this form of taxation should be applied to the benefit of our charitable institutions ; for if it is to raised I cannot see why it should not form part of the consolidated revenue. Now I eomo to tbjwtu&l summary of the

financial proposals. The various proposals are in this part of the Statement brought together in order that we may see the result. In the firs-; place I quite agree with the reduction of the postage. • But instead of reduction going exclusively in W direction, I think a portion of\rT should have taken of the. ..duties on the necessaries of life. Then,---£30,000 is to be devoted to tjieopen-ing-up of land for settlement/ £6,000 is to be applied to reduc'ng the duty on Native leases, anu £2t;820 -to meeting the estimated deficit in the 'Land Fund^ I certainly <a(gree with the first; $wo items. I may say, however, that in looking carefully through this summary I was very much disappointed at .' finding no mention made of .eduiJa^bn. Those honourable gentlemen ; ;who live in bush districts must know that these districts are very much behind other districts in relation to school matters; and, in fact, people residing in the towns know very little about the drawbacks of the people in these particular districts, because in the towns they have plenty .of rnqne^y to spend on their schools' ; but .jn, the country districts^ and . especial^ t .in these outside districts, a great' many :school; buildings are; wanted, . because the; roads are ;so bad; that •• t^e, children are unable to travel very, far. I had hoped that, the; imporj^ince of the matter,, would have, commended itself to the Minister of Elducatipn, and that his influence would have been exerted to: procure something out of the surplus for the benefit of the people in these districts in < ; ttie way of improved school facilities. HofwevdrV in this hope I have been : very much disappointed. I hope, however that even yet the honourable gentleman "will see his way to assisting these cbttn'try ScHboT'Boards who have very much to do with the money at their disposal, and that he will be able J to give assistance to the more/necessitous of the country sbh dole!.' '. (To' be continued.) |-