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New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 5843, 20 December 1879, Page 2

We publish in another column a schedule of the work done by the Parliament of 1879. It will be seen that a large amount of business has been done, and that the practical results of the session in the form of new laws are sufficiently numerous. It was said of the session of 1878 that only one important measure had been carried, viz., tho Land Tax. It has lived but a short life, and has now been swallowed up by a far more generally important measure of the same description, viz., the Property Tax. The Triennial Parliaments Act, and the electoral reform contained in the Qualification and the Registration of Electors Acts, which practically introduce short Parliaments and manhood suffrage pure andsimple, will mark 1879astheyearof the introduction of the first thoroughly democratic institutions which New Zealand has ever seen. The Land Act Amendment Act is also a very important measure, intended to promote settlement upon small holdings, by offering inducements in the shape of deferred payments and other liberal concessions to bona fide settlers. The Customs Tariff Act, the Revision of Statutes Act, the Public Works Act, and the Special Powers and Contracts Actare all measures of widespread application, affecting the general welfare of the community. In order to accomplish this work the House sat during fifty-five days, equal to four hundred and thirteen hours, or a daily average of seven and a-half hours. In 1878 the House sat seventy days, the sittings lasted four hundred and fifty hours, and averaged seven, hours daily. This session there were eighty-six Bills passed, as against one hundred and twelve in 1878 ; and sixty-eight dropped, as against seventy-seven in 1878. Considering that tho greater part of the first two months was wasted in useless discussion, the past session cannot be said to have been a barren one.