STATEMENT BY THE PREMIER.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 926, 3 December 1910, Page 3

STATEMENT BY THE PREMIER.

MR HERRIES GIVES ADVICE TO MINISTERS.

In the House on Wednesday the Premier stated that “he was better informed of what was going on in different portions of the country than any other man in it.'’ This remark was made by Sir Joseph Ward during his speecli in connect ion with the sale of a pamphlet by an Auckland Socialist in which he was viciously attacked. Mr [lorries refer led to the 1 1 ren ile r's remark at a. later stage of the sitting. He said he had not intended to speak, but he understood that whilst ho was out of the House attending a committee meeting, the Prime Minister had said he ' hail distributed pamphlets in regard to his past life. He wished to give this statement an unqualified denial. He would not do such a low-down thing, nor did ho think others of the party would, and ho would give it an nminalified denial. What it did show, however, was to what an extent people spied on members. It seemed, from what the Prime Minister said, that reports were coming to hand from various quarters about members of the House. It seemed that there wore spies all about the country dogging the footsteps of public men and reporting to headquarters accordingly. This he thought was a state of affairs to bo deprecated. If ho were in the position of the Prime Minister ho would put a stop to tittle-tattle of the kind. It was generally recognised that all informers were liars and the person who listened to them naturally only created dl-feeling with those he was dealing’ with, ana often, to use a colloquialism, “fell into the soup.’’ He sincerely hoped that the Prime Minister would discourage this sort of thing—which he understood was verv prevalent. He had no doubt that public life would be far better and far more pleasant if the class of men he had referred to were discouraged. Members would certainly live a more comfortable life. Referring to the Prime Minister s speech on Tuesday Mr Hernes remarked on the constant reference to “dead men, or “accusing dead men.” Ils thought this particular thing was rather overdone. Everyone, he thought, would acknowledge that to talk of the private life of a dead man was bad, but the public life of a man. alive or dead, was, he thought, subject for legitimate criticism. How, be asked, could we take lessons from the past if we did not consider what had been done by dead statesmen I