PARLIAMENTARY.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XVI, Issue 207, 31 August 1881, Page 2

PARLIAMENTARY.

[The first portion or" yesterday's Parliamentary proceedings will be found on the fourth r.age.|

Mr Hall replied at some length to Sir GGrey's remarks. The question now at issue was of even more importance than the Bill itself. It was whether a email majority of headstrong men should be allowed to coerce the majority and rule by an unscrupulous use of the forms of the House. These forms were never intended to allow a minority to impose its will on the majority, and paralyse the action of Parliament. This could not be tolerated either by the House or the country. At all hazards the Government was bound to maintain the fundamental principles of representative institutions that the will of the majority must and shall prevail All business was now practically suspended by the new form of obstruction. The present abuse of the forms of the House w»8 grievous and scandalous and no deliberative body could tolerate suoh a state of affairs, and day by day the anger of the country was being excited by it. The Government could have smpathised with the Nelson members in any reasonable objection. They knew what they owed to those members, and regretted the course that their duty had compelled them to take. Had any concession been consistent with that duty the Go-, vernment tvould gladly have made it to the Nelson members, but now, of course, any compromise was impossible, and the Government would make none. No other business should he gone on with until this Bill was dealt with by the House. The Government would suffer nothing else to be done now until the Bill became law. The majority wonld not allow themselves to be set at defiance, and the House to be made the laughing stock of the country, but would assert its authority and show that the majority must rule.

Messrs Speight, Levestam, and Seddon continued the discussion until 12.30, when, while the latter was talking, the House was counted out.