PEARLS FROM PARLIAMENT

Free Lance, Volume II, Issue 58, 10 August 1901, Page 17

PEARLS FROM PARLIAMENT

THIS country is governed now by the liquor traffic. That is the result of the female franchise. — Hon. Mr. McLean. • • » Now, we have in New Zealand the freest Constitution in the world — nothing could be freer , no referendum we could have enacted could give us greater freedom than we have at present. — Hon. Mr. Reeves. • • • One might see there scattered fragments of law buried in masses of statutory matter which would puzzle one almost as much as the notable fly in the amber. One would wonder by what diabolical cunning they had got there at all. They were a puzzle both, to the unwary and the wary. — Mr. Collins, on Law Consolidation. • » • When one oonsiders the hardships, discomforts, privations, and difficulties the early settlers had to encounter in this colony, I think they are entitled to every praase and credit. Speaking personally, when I meet one of these old colonists, be he dressed in fustian, in home>-made tweed, or in broadcloth, I feel disposed to take off my hat and do him reverence for the valuable services he has rendered to the colony. — Mr. Meredith. • • • I do not hesitate for an instant to say that a horse-race is an inspiring and ennobling sight. Ido not condemn horse-racing itself. I believe it is one of the most exciting, enthralling, and beautiful spectacles one can witness. A beautiful green field, a well-cultivated and well-kept lawn covered with welldressed ladies a number of jockeys on splendidly-trained horses, and every animal straining to come in first. A nobler sight could not be imagined, but we have to look deeper, and to see the evils that are behind. — Mr. Laurenson.

I say nothing of the Bill , I know nothing about it. I believe it has the almost unanimous disapproval of the legal profession, and I suppose that is to a, certain extent m its favour. — Mr. Arkw right on the Referendum. • • ♦ Look at "Tattersall's" sweeps in Tasmania. Two young men in my district won £10,000 between them in "Tattersall's," and I think that if the honourable member in charge of the Bill thought he would win a sum like that he would be induced to invest a pound in that way himself. — Mr. Bennet. • * • Mr. Fisher. — Will the honourable gentleman kindly inform me what the gentlemen on other side are laughing at? Mr. McGowan. — Sometimes I am able to explain, but in this instance I am not able to do so — possibly they are laughing at me, and, if so, I have very little objection. He who laughs last laughs best. • • * Mr. Tunbridge has no experience in organizing a Force. He is not an organiser. In obsolete criminal theories Mr. Tunbridge may be an authority of some kind, but his antecedents, and being an essentially city man of a bygone period, stamp him as being utterly unequal to the intelligence of up-to-date criminal experts, or to the varying conditions of a colonial community. — Mr. G. Fisher. • ♦ * He might not get an invitation to be present at the coronation, and he might not be Premier then , but, in any case, he would never again allow anyone to be placed in a position similar to that in which he himself was placed in going to the Jubilee celebration in 1897. He was not at all anxious to represent the colony , he would personally prefer to remain at home and look after things. — The Premier. An hon. member. — Is that sarcasm p • * * I say this Bill will be a boon both to mistresses and to servants. I say if the conditions are made easier for the girls, if the girl are put on a better social footing, if they are not treated, they so often are, as if they belonged to a sort of pariah class, as if they belonged to some very low caste, the owners of the houses will find that there are plenty of suitable girls to assist in house-work and to help overworked mothers of families. — Mr Barclay, on possible effects of Shops Bill on servants.

Gambling is inherent in every human being. It commences with a pocketful of marbles. The honourable member can surely recollect the time when, as a boy, he used to play marbles. Was he not gambling then? Was he no. trying to filch, from his brother schoolboy most of his marbles? — Mr. A. L. D. Fraser on the youth of an hon. member. • • ♦ I remember, sir, some little time ago, when there was a question of regulating the taxation of this country, the honourable member for Ashley said, "I would raise the taxes of this country by putting 3d a gallon duty on beer." The honourable member for Ashburton, with his usual acumen, said, "How much of that money will you pay?" — Mr. Lawry. * • • The totalisator has this strong recommendation, to my mind that it is a cash transaction — there is no credit. It has been said that this colony reaps a benefit from the totalisator. I say it is quite right that the colony should, but it must not be forgotten that out of this evil comes good, for the money accruing from the totalisator goes to charitable purposes. — Mr. A. L. D. Fraser. * * ♦ Mr. Tunbridcre was selected as the ablest man in Great Britain to go to North America, to South America, to South Africa, and to the Australian Colonies to carry out most important duties on behalf of the Government. Therefore I cordially support the appointment of Mr. Tunbridge, and I think we have in him the right man in the right place. — Mr. Witheford. • • • If the honourable gentleman wants to do anything in the way of reform, let him try to abolish gambling in shares. But that would not be so popular, because there are clergymen and very virtuous people who declaim about the totalisator, though they are not afraid to speculate their "little bit" on dredging shares. We are all willing to condemn the things we are not inclined to. — Mr. Carnoross. ♦ • • This affection for their national sports has always made the British people wherever they have gone. If you deprive the British people of that sentiment — love of football, field sports, racing, and fighting — you make them a cold, soulless nation, without any warm impulses ; you weaken them as individuals and as a community, and must necessarily weaken them as a nation. — Mr. Carroll."

I remember some time ago being on the goldfielda in another portion of this Island, and in the next room to me language was going on that would have made one of the bullock drivers in the olden days turn green with envy. — Hon. Mr. Jennings. • * • Mr. Fisher. — They are never satisfied w ith anything ; nothing will ever satisfy them. Mr Pirani. — Nothing will satisfy them until liquor is totally prohibited. Mr. Fisher. — Would you like to see it done? » # ♦ If the world was full of perfect men, men who knew no 1 vice, men like the honourable member for Ashley, above purity itse'f, men who denounce every form of what they deem to be cvil — if you had a world composed of such men, what a world! What a nice place to live in! — Mr. Carroll. • • • He considered this objection to vaccination was an objection that would not hold good for one moment. Were we to have an epidemic of smallpox in New Zealand — and we had seen that it was not very far from us lately — these conscientious objectors would be ready enough to take the alarm. — Hon. Geo. McLean. • • • If the honourable member in charge of this Bill had only brought down a Bi'l to stop these infernal "wild oat" schemes which are foisted on the innocent people of the colony we should have applauded him. lam a victim, and I speak feelingly , but I have no such feeling against the totalisator. — Mr. A. L. D. Fraser. • • • Mr. Lawry.— True. What did the Po'ice Commission prove? That we have a better Police Force in New Zealand than exists in any other British Dominion. An hon. member.— They are better now. Mr. Lawry. — And why are they better now? Because they had common-sense men like myself to represent them in the House.

It needs Lord Byron's brilliant pen, Hh clever, brainy head, To tell us how and why and when Some people ai c not dead. But since he's gone we'll tell the way, How good hsahh to assure, And colds and hacking coughs allay, Take Woods' Great Peppermint Cure.