The Patea Mail. (Published Wednesdays and Saturdays.) SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 1879.

Patea Mail, Volume V, Issue 480, 29 November 1879, Page 2

The Patea Mail. ( Published Wednesdays and Saturdays.) SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 1879.

- ♦ A desperate struggle has taken place over the question of introducing the Redistribution ot Seats Bill, not because any one thought that it was still possible in the fag euil of the Session to do justice to it, but because the Opposition felt bound to prove that the Government wished to shirk some ot the Liberal Measures. Being confounded by the constellation of excellent Bills that have been brought down, a few of the small men, who never learn anything and never forget anything, gathered round the Bill we have named for a last desperate struggle. According to their creed, nothing would have been done if the House, or, at least, the country, were not persuaded that the Government were ylaying fast and loose with the policy

by which they had undertaken to stand or fall. Insincerity was the charge that had been most effectually brought home to themselves, and they therefore drew the weapon from their open wounds to try its edge on the enemy. They then discovered that the effect of a charge depends somewhat on its truth. Thrice is he armed that hath his qnarrhiL just, And lie but naked, though- locked up in steel, Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted. It was at first thought that it would be dangerous for the Government to hold the Redistribution of Seats Bill over till next Session. It is a measure about which the more influential constituencies of the colony feel strongly, and one that seemed in its natural place when in company with the Triennial Bill and the Electoral Bill. The friends of the Government, therefore, thought it would be dangerous to let it stand over, and the Opposition hoped that it might, by some means, be crowded out, so as to afford a point of attack. But as weeks passed away, and the Government became securely established, and the Opposition grew powerless, except for wasting time, it was felt that the danger was past. The House and the country had so far recovered from their over-dose of Grcyism that they wore no longer in danger of being “ bamboozled.” The “ preternatural suspicion” with which demogogues contrive to surcharge their followers was approaching the vanishing point, and it was therefore likely that a fair construction would be placed ou the fact of the Bill having been crowded out. The charge of strangling the Bill before it saw the light will now probably be laid at the door of those whose factious opposition and inexhaustable talk left no time for the debate without which so momentous a Bill could not be passed. While there was a danger of the next Session beginning with an appeal to the country, the question of Redistribution was a pressing one, and one which every fair minded elector wished to see settled. But now that the Government have not only declared their policy, but also carried much of it out, and thereby obtained the reluctant confidence of Parliament, the Redistribution 'Bill can be treated el leisure and with the thoroughness and care that it demands. It is, as we have pointed out before, a measure that will keep, and improve by keeping. The longer the Redistribution can be postponed, the more thorough a lasting the results will bo.

It is not like the Electoral Bill or the Land Bill, the effects of Which begin to be felt as soon as they cease to be Bills and become Acts. Apart from the question of danger to the Government and of the risk of an untimely dissolution, there is no reason "whatever why the Seats should not be redistributed next Session, •when there will be more time and less work. Indeed, as we have said, the •advantages lies rather with the postponement. The only persons who can bo interested ns to when the thing is done, so long as it is done before the next General Election, are the members whose Districts may he divided or absorbed, and who may wish to make provision for the future.

No danger to the Government need now be apprehended, because the Bill has been fairly crowded out. The Ministry ■have endeavored by all reasonable means to pnsh business on, and arc prolonging the Session to the latest moment possible, and yet it is highly probably that some Bills before the House will lapse simply for want of time to carry them through. What, then, would have been the -case, if to the, already -too .numerous bones of contention had been added such a many sided and unexhaustable subject of debate as the Redistribution of Seats ? The Bill must inevitably have lapsed itself, after occupying time for nothing, and have caused the lapsing of other, in themselves, more pressing matters. The number of Liberal measures that the Government have adopted are a guarantee that they will not attempt to burk the Bill. How could those who practically consent to manhood suffrage, who extend the franchise to women, who pass a Triennial Bill, and who determine that the present Parliament, in which they have a majority, shall last less than three years, oppose the fairest and most reasonable of the three great measures that make up the Liberal programme ? What interest can they have in strangling the measure? Even supposing them to be as selfish and designing as their enemies say they are, what selfish end have they in view? If the subject were disagreeable to them, they have at least the good sense to know that if they go before the country again without having passed the Bill into law, the country will elect others to pass it who will do so in a form still less agreeable. The truth is that the Government intend to make the Bill we are treating of the great measure of next Session, and at the same time to improve upon the Greyite proposal. They intend increasing the number of seats so that small and isolated places, whose interests are peculiar, may have a representative in Parliament without doing injustice to larger places. As things now stand, nothing less than an eighty-fourth part of the European population should have a member. In other words, each constituency should contain more than five thousand inhabitants. It is obvious that in a country where the population is so unevenly scattered, it should be possible to represent something less than an eighty-fourth of the whole. There are many places in New Zealand where from, three to four thousand people aregathered/

to which at present it would ori the basis of population be unfair to give d member, thus placing them on a level with places with from six to eight thousand inhabitants, But if the number of members were increased, so that there would be one fonlvery three thousand or four thousand, then justice might be done to all. This would, of course, increase the cost of Parliament by increasing the number of honoraria to be paid, but ou the other hand the Housel would represent the feeling of the country far better than it does at present, and would probably be less liable to the influence of corruption. The chief cause of corruption at present existing is the narrowness of the majorities by which the fate of Ministries is decided. This allows a small band of men, or even a single individual, to hold the balance of power. The temptation to buy over these grasping and conseieneiless arbiters is almost firresistable. In a House in which, say, a hundred and twenty members sat, there would probably be larger majorities, and the power ot the ‘ rat’ element in Parliament would disappear.