LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 608, 31 May 1851, Page 2

LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL

Thursday, May 29, 185 b The Council met shortly after two o C '?‘ His Excellency the Governor-in-Chief al the table drafts of the following ordinance ■ An ordinance to authorize the Go , verß0 [ t |,;j apply a portion of the land fund arising* • municipal district at the irisunce.® ( corporation thereof, and a bill /° r 11 census of the colony of New Zealand ■ On the motion of the Attorney-Gon® Debtors’ Writ of Arrest Bill was r® a time,

On the motion of Mr. Hickson the Customs Ordinance was read a first time. On the motion of the Colonial Secretary the Naturalization Ordinance was read a first time. On the motion of the Colonial Treasurer the Marriage Amendment Ordinance was read a first time. NOTICES OF MOTION. The following notices of motion were given by hon. members for to-morrow First reading' of Land Fund Appropriation Bill by Lieut.-Col. M’Cleverty. First reading of New Zealand Land Company’s Land Claimants Bill by Capt. Smith. First reading of Census Bill, and second reading of Naturalization Ordinance, by the Colonial Secretary. Second reading of Customs Ordinance by Mr. Hickson.

Second reading of Debtor’s Writ of Arrest Bill by the Attorney General. Sppnnrl varazlinr. *»£ A — _—J. * ~ _ .v-u.ug v * luamagG XXIUCUULiiCIII Ordinance by the Colonial Treasurer. Sir George Grey said, that with reference to the regulations for squatting, as it would be out of the power of the Government to do anything until the Council should enact an Ordinance authorising the Land Commissioners to inflict fines and penalties in certain cases, in order to afford them full knowledge of the intentions of the Government he would at their next meeting lay before them a draft of the regulations, so that the Council might have an opportunity of seeing them, and of throwing out such of them as may be adverse to the interests of the colonists. The Council was then adjourned to tomorrow, at two o’clock.

Friday, May 29. The Council met at two o’clock. . Sir George Grey’ laid on the table a draft .MW xvvguiuv.vuo JLyvpuovuuug vyulliC, which on the motion of the Colonial Secretary was ordered to be printed. On the motion of Col. M'Cleverty the Land Fund Appropriation Bill was read a first time. On the motion of Capt. Smith the New Zealand Company’s Land Claimants Bill was read a first, time. The Colonial Secretary moved the first reading of the Census Bill ; the hon. member also moved the second reading of the Naturalization Ordinance. CUSTOMS DUTIES BILL. Mr. Hickson, in moving the second reading of the Customs Duties Bill, said that the operation of a fixed rate of Duties, as proposed by this measure in lieu of an advalorem rate, would be found to give satisfaction to the importers of goods and to the Government, while the change would not be disadvantageous to the revenue. The effect of the present ad valorem duties was to exact the highest rate of duty when the article on which the duty was levied was in request and the supply limited, so that the ad valorem duty acted as a sliding scale the wrong way. He instanced the article of flour which, if it rose to £4O a ton, under the present law would bear a duty in the same ratio to the price, and the remark would apply to other articles. The scale of duties now proposed had been prepared after careful consideration by a committee of the Provincial Council, of which he had the honor to be a member, in 1849, and with some slight alterations he thought it might be adopted with advantage. He-thought that as an encouragement to sheep farming, which was daily becoming of more importance in the colony, tobacco for sheep washing should be allowed duty free, as previous to its leaving the bonded warehouse it might be submitted to a process which would render it unfit for being used for other purposes. In the schedule, whale and other fish oils and whalebone were enumerated as free of duty, and he presumed this was intended to apply to Foreign as well as British oil and bone.

The motion was seconded by the Colonial Treasurer.■■ .

Sir George Grey said that the present measure was an important change in the previous system of legislation, that no difference would be made between foreign and British produce, and on this principle the measure had been framed.

the Collector* of Customs objected to poisoning tobacco in bonded warehouses for aheepwashing as suggested by Mr. Hickson, as S . Uc “ a practice might by accident cause the ( >eath of many persons. t Grey observed that it was inen ea in the present measure to do away with ’’criminating duties between foreign and Bris produce; the Home Government had arnestly recommended the abolition in the th n > ni i eS , of .Criminating duties, as it was trart gbt desirable that a peculiar system of trarlZ b . e tried ’ l ' ie s y stem of free Dim ri j • k een i ntr °duced into the British emcolnnia U V s P ro Posed to extend it to the s» so that the same system would obtain I ■ ■■ . * ■■■■> ?

throughouLthe entirety of the British dominions, they should not, therefore, in legislating, set up a system of policy adverse to that which was about to be established. It was intended to make the experiment of free trade throughout the whole extent of the British qmpire, and it would be becoming in them to allow such an experiment to be fully tried. The Colonial Secretary said that as the scale of .-.duties in the Schedule had been framed on the old tariff it virtually established discriminating duties, and new calculations would be necessary in order that the schedule should agree with the principles of free trade. The Collector of Customs .thought this would be unnecessary; according to the advalorem rate now levied, a duty of 12j per cent was imposed on foreign and 10 per cent on british goods, but no discrimination was made in the Schedule.

Sir George-Grey said, that by the original tariff a duty of per cent was levied on certain articles of consumption, as tea, sugar. &c. which were the produce of foreign countries, and as these articles were nearly all. of that kind the schedule did not establish a dis--criminating duty: on all unenumerated articles such as cotton goods, clocks, chairs and other articles which are brought as well from America as from England, it was proposed to fix the duty at 10 per cent, he therefore thought the Schedule was in conformity with the principles the British Government was attempting to establish. The Bill was then read a second time. DEBTORS WRIT OF ARREST BILL. The Attorney General in moving that this bill be read a second time said, that before the disuse of the Courts of Request, the Commissioners of that Court had the power to issue warrants to prevent the escape of debtors from the Colony and that this power had been acted upon both at Wellington and Auckland ; of late years there had not been much occasion for the exercise of this power, but inconveu—ieuce had been felt at Auckland lately during the Californian speculations for want a law of this kind. By the present bill the power of issuing warrants in the absence of the Judge was lodged in the hands of the Registrar of the Supreme Court where there was a Registrar, aud where there was no Registrar, in the hands of the Resident Magistrate of the settlement ; ; the powers were the same in the present bill, as those in the former law and provision was made to prevent the unnecessary detention of the prisoner. j Mr. Hickson thought, in the present state of the law, 48 hours notice should be given by persons intending to leave the Colony to prevent the escape of debtors on a Sunday. The Attorney General proposed to obviate this difficulty by a more simple measure, namely to allow the writ of arrest to be executed on a Sunday. Bill read a second time. MARRIAGE AMENDMENT BILL. The Colonial Treasurer in moving the second reading of this bill said, he disagreed with the principle of it which was the same as that on which the Marriage Ordinance is founded, and considered it a matter of regret the principle established in England was not carried out. There the State exacts only the evidence of a legal contract and is satisfied with that, without pretoribing any directions as to the religious ceremony. He thought the bill ought not to be committed until there was a full council when he should be prepared to make other objections. The Colonial Secretary bad been requested to present some petitions on this subject, and proposed that the second reading be deferred until the arrival of the other members of Council.

Sir George Grey thought the Colonial Treasurer wrong in stating that the principle of this bill varied from that in England. The principle was to this effect, that the State requires only registration as Evidence of a marriage. In England no marriage was legalunless performed in a church, or by a registrar, or in some licensed place of worship. In a new country like this where the population was thin and scattered, instead of a building the individual was licensed, and there was this advantage that in this case the person licensed carried his powers with him. The law requires nothing more than registration and according to the proposed ordinance the clergyman, while he performs the religious part of the ceremony, can also do all that is required by law to make the marriage complete. This was the only departure from the law in England, unless any recent alterations had been made, and his Excellency considered this was an improvement on it. His Excellency then laid on the table the Valley of the Hutt Fencing Bill.

NATURALIZATION ORDINANCE, On the motion of the Colonial Secretary the Council went into Committee on the Naturalization Bill. A discussion arose in Committee from the circumstance that some of the persons in*New Ulster included in the bud set oppo-

site their names the dates from which they were desirous of being naturalized, as they I had acquired landed property subsequent to these dates which made this a point of importance to them, an alien being incapacitated by law from holding landed property in a British colony. His Excellency suggested that the schedule should be allowed to remain to a later period of the Session so that others who should know what was going on might, if they pleased, be naturalized also. His Excellency also, proposed an amendment,-which might be adopted by the .Council as a rule to be observed in other bills, namely, that instead of “ Colony of NewrZealand” the words “ Islands of New Zealand” be inserted, as these words have generally been used in all recent documents relating to New Zealand. The Colonial Secretary referred to a circular by Lord Grey, 26th Sept., 1847»announcing the passing of an Act of Parliament for theNaturalivation of Aliens, in which his Lordship states as one of the results of the Act that “ all Naturalization Laws shall be subject to the rules which regulate the enactment and disallowance of Colonial Laws on any other subject,” and moved the following amendment “ That this Bill come into operation from and after the passing thereof,” instead of the -2nd clause in its present shape. The other parts of the Bill were agreed to and the Committee adjourned. J ’ NOTICES or MOTION. Mr. Hickson gave notice that he would move at the next sitting of the Council that the Customs Ordinance be considered in committee. The following notices of motion were also given by hon. members for Tuesday,— " Second reading of Land Fund Appropriation Bill, by Lieut;-Col. M’Cleverty. First reading of the Valley of the Hutt Fencing Bill by the Colonial Treasurer. Second reading of Census Bill by the Colonial Secretary. Second reading of New inland Company’s Laud Claimants Billvby Captain Smith. ■ The Attorney-General also gave notice that he would move that the Debtors Writ of Arrest Bill be considered in committee on Tuesday. It was arranged that the days on which the Council should meet during the Session should be Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday - . W . The Council then-wdjourned to Tuesday next, at