Manawatu Herald. THURSDAY, JULY 18. 1899 Independent Liberals.

Manawatu Herald, 13 July 1899, Page 2

Manawatu Herald. THURSDAY, JULY 18. 1899 Independent Liberals.

During the coming elections we shall have many queer titles given as those under which the candidate seeks the vote of the publicj but the most of Which will be only sound signifying nothing more than the desire of the candidate to get into parliament. We have had lately quite a. crop of *• Independent Liberals " which i£ the title is anything representative of the candidates, means little of any value to any electorate. At present the Liberal party is in power, and an "independent " member is just one of those men who will not support that party, or for the matter of fact, any party in which he is not accorded a distinguished position. An " independent ' member becomes a nuisance to the Government, the Opposition, and the country. Nobody can rely on what his following move may be. To-day he may succeed in ousting a government from power, and to-morrow he may vote against the new government formed, it only needs a sufficient number of these " independents " to upset government by party. A government that has had a long run of power and has had a big "Majority, - necessarily is led into many improper positions and transactions, the .publication of which is to the public benefit, but it may be taken for granted that the wrong doing of any government has come from pressure without, and perhaps has arisen from the very desire to please some " independent " member of the party. Party government is a very costly matter to a country, but the time is not ripe to resort to any other means of controlling the public revenue, but for Party government to live it is absolutely necessary that there should be two parties in the House pretty evenly divided in numbers. At present we have one party, the Liberals, who

appear to know what they want, and also how to get it, and the members of that party admit their obligations and vote on party questions at the dictation of the party Whip. Then there are a certain number of members who profess themselves in opposition to the government but they do not seem to have been successful in getting the public to understand where the difference, politically, lies between them and the government. They not only are prepared to swallow wholesale all the past legislation of the present government but they refuse in anyway to make clear what further legislation they would introduce, but they lead one to suppose that they would be inclined to '♦ lay upon their oars " and let legislation have a rest. This would be a decided gain if they would agree to do so, as we have had enough experimental legislation to last for some years. The question is do they mean this, and if they do what chances have they of giving effect to their views? The government at present has a majority without the "independent " liberals, and the Opposition cannot seriously hope that these skirmishers would give them much support beyond, the destruction of the Premier. The Opposition needs much strengthening, and needs an amount of amalgamation, which almost appears impossible of attainment when the individuals are examined. Thus we much regret the position politics have fallen into, and the weakness there is apparent in the Opposition and this will explain the reason we so strongly object to the claims an independent candidate has upon the electors.