The Telephone. PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING. GISBORNE, SATURDAY, MAY 31.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume I, Issue 145, 31 May 1884, Page 2

The Telephone. PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING. GISBORNE, SATURDAY, MAY 31.

We are concerned to see that the session bids fair to begin without any promise of improvement in the political situation. The Government are in a minority. The Opposition still split into two parties—one under Sir Geo. Grey, with perhaps a dozen sycophants and blind followers of the Rees-DeLautour-Fenwick type—and Mr. Montgomery, supported by Mr. Macandrew, with possibly twice as many supporters. The country wants none of the three. It wants rest; it wants economical finance; and it wishes for the moment to silence all proposals for spasmodic or sensational political experiments. Major Atkinson has ruled the country long, but always rested his strength on borrowed money. Of twenty-three millions he has had the spending of twenty-and-a-half, and directly the amount obtainable was reduced, he has fallen /’zoo.ood in arrear on his own estimates. Sir George Grey is too much bent on Utopian perfection to be gained only by the ruin of the rich to be trustworthy in a time of commercial crisis ; while Mr. Montgomery’s separation scheme would only aggravate present evils by lessening the security of the public creditor. What we want is a fusion of the moderate practical men of all parties to repair the wreck of our prosperity. When the good ship is sea-w’orthy again she may be able to stand against the perils of the dangerous navigation of the different theories ventilated by the several parties. Just now we wish to know how' to pay our way without crushing the colonists with burdens they ill can bear. We need to discover the fairest and most practicable mode of raising a revenue adequate to our w'ants and obligations without either depreciating property to a ruinous degree, driving the working class out of the country, or unduly favoring any class or interest whatever. That is the problem, and it can neither be solved as Major Atkinson has usually solved it by borrowing more, nor by the hysterical attacks intended to bring about internecine strife between classes, as Sir George Grey would advise us, nor by plunging into the unknown sea of separation as Mr. Montgomery desires. We do hope that shortly a new prophet may arise to save the colony from its difficulties and its so-called friends.