SECOND READING OF THE ABOLITION BILL.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume III, Issue 298, 14 August 1875, Page 2

SECOND READING OF THE ABOLITION BILL.

The Colonial Treasurer rose, amid applause, to move the second reading of the Abolition Bill. He said they might, had they so chosen, merely have brought down a bill repealing the Constitution Act, or rather its second clause. That would have met the ease sufficiently ; but if they could abolish one province—and no one could say they could not —what was to prevent them abolishing collectively what they could do individually and separately. They had, as a general controlling authority, full power to alter their own Constitution whenever they thought fit to do so. Coming to what they proposed to do by this bill —on that he would be very Lrief. They simply proposed to give the people real local self-government in the fullest sense of the word. (Loud applause, and derisive laughter from the Opposition.) The hon. gentleman then proceeded to comment on clause six, and explain why the Government left certain questions open for further consideration during the recess. It was so that they might be able to submit next session certain measures in relation to matters in that clause which were now left in »tatu quo regarding clause eight, and it was considered necessary that they should reserve the power to delegate subordinate powers, and that the locality should have power over local taxation, and all such items of taxation were handed over to them. Clause 19 related to Road Boards, and made an important provision.- He saw by the Opposition organs that they said Government would not be able to carry out these provisions and make substantial endowments. He had no doubt whatever that all the promises made in the financial statement would be easily fulfilled. The bill would also provide for gaols, police, lunatic asylums, and charitable institutions; They had been taken to task about the manner in which the bill had been introduced, blit he was not aware of aiy Constitutional law for preventing the Crown from relieving the people from disagreeable liabilities and from disagreeable bodies of servants. (Hear, hear.) It would at once set free some thirty or forty very hard-working public servants, and also set free some hundred or more gentlemen who must every year come down to meet their Provincial Councils to vote away the money of the people. If House complains of anything, it surely ought not to complain and assert that the Government should not bring down a bill like that—a bill which amply supplied in most cases, and paved the way in others, for what the people had been wanting for years. It had also been alleged that the bill had not been brought down in the form it had. He would ask, —What good had Provincial Councils done for the country of late years, that Road Boards and the General Government could not have done and have done more efficiently, as well as more economically ? (Hear, hear.) No doubt there was a time when Provincial Councils performed very useful functions. In the early days they served a very good purpose, but during the last few years, they altogether failed to perform these functions, and immigration eeased, and stagnation prevailed until in 1870 the House by general acclamation placed the control of these works in the hands of the General Government. He could say, from his experience in these matters, that Provincial Governments had never shewn that they could perform those functions which they maintained pertained to them particularly, so well as the General Government and Road Boards could. If Provincial Governments wanted to promote education, or look after harbours, they bad always to depute the work to someone else, in the shape of Education Boards and Harbour Boards, and if Provincial Governments were tolerably well managed he saw an argument in favour of one administration. Provincial Govms- - possessed two functions—legislative and administrative—and it was agreed on all hands that the legislative functions should cease. (Loud cries of “ No, no’” and “ Yes, yes.”) But the hon. member reiterated again and again in spite of interruptions that it was admitted on all hands, both by the House and the country, that the legislative functions of the provinces should cease. The only function the Provincial ‘Governments performed well was getting money out of the Assembly. It was a sound principle of political economy that the powers which imposed and raised taxes should spend the money, and be the responsible power. But was that the way provincial legislation worked ? (Loud cries of “ No, no.”) Provincial Councils raised money from the people in various ways, and it as they liked without giving the General Government any account of

it, excepting as a matter of history. It therefore was desirable this state of things should continue no longer. (No.) The voice of the country and House was unmistakably against it. (Hear, hear.) Referring to the system of organised provincial pressure which was partly brought to bear against the Government of the colony in maintaining and perpetuating the local interests that were antagonistic to the general interest of the colony, he maintained that the voice of the country was decidedly against all, owing to the possibility of so unfair and selfish A pressure being allowed to continue a day longer. The peculiar circumstances of this case reminded him very strongly of a passage in an essay that was called lig Philosophy,” which no doubt members were as well acquainted with as he was. It was to this effect : What is pig philosophy ? It was this : What is'justice? It is, in the general swinehood sense of the terms, in getting on as much out of the swine Sk as you can get, without being or sent to the galleys. Now, he was sure the House would agree with him that the colony would be benefitted by the sweeping away from New Zealand of those centres of sympathy —those nine sturdy mendicants, regarding which the member for the Hutt used to speak with some asperity before he joined their ranks. There was no doubt that their credit would be largely increased by passing thjs bill, their administration also would be cheapened, and the country would secure the services of many able and honest gentlemen as soon as they were released from the trammels which so bound them to Provincialism, —in some cases through self-interest, in others through old associations. They were told this Aet took away the liberties of the people; but he wondered how the hon. member for Auckland City West could have got such an opinion. Although he held, speaking in the broad sense, that every man in New Zealand was fully represented in the present Parliament, of course he must be understood not to be taking into account at the present moment certain inequalities in the representation of the colony. He held that by this bill very many in New Zealand would be still better represented than they were before. They were also told that the bill should be referred to the electors before being passed by the Assembly, but he could confidently ask the House, had the bill not been already referred to the electors, and had they not already decided ■ in its favour from onie end of the country to the other ? (Cries of “ No, no,” and “ Yes, yes.”) The party to which he bad theJmnor to belong for the last twenty years always consistently strove for the vital principle of this bill. He only regretted that the hon. gentleman who was the recognised champion of this principle had not the duty of moving the second reading of the bill, and thus completing the scheme with which his name had been identified for so many years. In conclusion, he need only say that the principle, and it prevaded the bill from the one end to the other, was the unity and oneness of the colony, and the only principle consistent with true local self-government, and that was what this bill provided.