HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume X, Issue 223, 4 September 1875, Page 2

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES.

The House met at 2.30. Alter a little lormal business Mr Thompson resumed tlie adjourned debate on Abolition and criticised unfavorably tables prepared by the Treasurer, showing how the proposals of Government -would affect the provinces. The Hon. member quoted some calculations of hie own to show how the provinces would actually be serious losers. He said there would be an end to the land fund in two years, and he did not think the Government kuaw tluiir own minds on the matter. They were pacing interest on loans out of loan., and spending borrowed money otherwi-e than in reproductive works, nnd in fact for the l«t few years, the House had been unable to check the expenditure of Government, and the civil serviee was overshadowing the country. It now numbered 5256 on the list, and what would it be when provincialism was aho'ished, and its ca>t off servants swelled the ranks of the Civil Service. Mr M'Glashsn said those servants would not be on the list if they were not wanted, and referred to the Otago Council voting four hundred thousand pounds more than it possessed a? an instance of provincial logrolling. Mr Wood eaid he had never seen so unfair a construction put upon a speech as the Native Minister did upon that of the member for AuckUnd, in accueiug him of desiring to sunder our connection with the parent country. The hon gentleman criticised the fioance of the colony aa fallacious, and intolerably unfair and oppressive to the people of Auckland. He said the member for Timaru wished them to set up the New Zealand Legislature as superior to tee Imperial and referred, in doing «>, totheßtateslieneral of Franca, The case wa. not an analogous one; the people were with the states General, aud enabled them to carry K ,pS fde-pite the teyoaet. of Louii the

Sixteenth, but the people were to a man against the Qovernment, snd would not assist them to-morrow, if they were wanted. Speaking for Auckland, not a man in the province would opposes change in the prestnt form of Government, but they would all join heart and hand in resisting thia measure, and if passed they woul \ not obey it, and if tbe Superintendents of Auckland. Wellington, C mterbury, and Otago, to'd the people of those provinces that the General Assembly had set itself up as an independent power, ani also fold them they could make themselves supreme in tbeir own districts, they would be surrounded by the enthusiast c people of those provinces It would be belter for Auckland to separate as a colony by herself, or to extend the right hand oi fellowship to Wellington, and to do the best they cor' d for themselves. The speaker was interrupted at 5.80. Saturday. On lhe Hou«e resuming at 7 30, Mr Wood continued his speech, and went into a long array of figures to show that the Treasurer was altogether wrong in his culculatton regarding the Isnd fund. Ha retaliated so severely upon some remarks of Mr Buckland regarding hirmeli thst he was called to order by the speaker, and concluded his speech wiih a contemptuous description of how the colony was existing upon borrowed money. Mr T^L. Shephard immediately jumped up and asked how the House could rely on the hon. gent! Jinan's figures, when in one item alone regarding Otsgo he was ii error £28,000. Mr Brown (Otago), moved the adjournment of the debate until the Government brought down their Board of Works Bill. Owing to some misunderstanding or other cause no Ministerialist spoke during there-, mainder of the night, though the debate was kept up till two a.m., when 15 voted for Mr Brown's amendment and 87 against it. Major Atkinson replies on Tuesday.