A Parliamentary Note-Book

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 162, 29 September 1927, Page 10

A Parliamentary Note-Book

Relief WorkCritidsed (THE SLAVS Parliamentary s , WELLINGTON. wL£T trj Discussion on the fourth^' Supply Bill. Which lffl l'Ms t through all Stages in th- u Representatives todgv of mainly to unemployment to B C ? mla *i tion making the most of th„Cp>itl- - to criticise the Gove™° rpor ' relief-work policy. overn a>oat' a The Christchurch District tw Amendment Bill was put throng 6 remaining stages and la'erTT * e spection of Machinery "AmenX, Iafo"o W “ P“’'ature Amendment Bill was r=ad V « ' time. 4 ®«t A Nightly Prayer This is Mr. E. J. Howard's cones*, tion of the prayers which Minister?, the Crown say nightly before retirir* “Oh Lord, turn something up t o-mt row to get these unemployed off hands.” a sic Fast Borrowing After listening to debates in ti. House and sizing members nn what he considers their speeches a™ worth, the Hon. W. Nos worthy esti mates that any Government ‘ rou],l quire to borrow £1,000.000 weekly to satisfy the insistent demands which are made by members from all of the House. “If you want a Government to l»r row faster than we borrow, then rm it,” Mr. Nosworthy saic! in the Hcase to-day, as he glanced across at the Opposition members, whose criticise. he had listened to. Mr. J. A. Lee: Impossible. Mr. J. McCombs: You are doing a ’ion a month now. * * * Hours of Restaurants Before the Shops and Offices Act is altered fixing the hours of restaur" ants and tea rooms, Mr. T. Ai. Wiliord wants to have it so arranged that ail parties concerned will be able to f ire evidence before some committee of th» House of Representatives, and he will address a question on this subject to the Minister of Labour. The Shops and Offices Amendment Bill was reported back from tko Labour Bills Committee last week in an amended form. ***■ Something Constructive In a long procession of speeches 01 unemployment, the majority of which contained nothing which the House had not hea-d previously, the most con structure suggestion came from Mr G. W. Forbes, Leader of the National Party, who asked the Government tt appoint a Parliamentary Committee to deal with New Zealand's oul-ol-work army. His suggestion was that the responsibility should be lifts; from Ministerial shoulders and that a committee should take evidence aid reports from members of Parliament, who would ascertain the exact position in each district and prescat progress statements on what was being done. Roads and Motorists The opinion that the present sytem of road maintenance cannot be sustained much longer on account cf the heavy burden upon the counties, was expressed by Mr. D. Jones, member for Ellesmere, in the House cl Representatives this evening. Air. Jones said that the question of what was to be done regarding road construction vras becoming a serious problem for county councils, and the Alain Highways Board, in view of the enormously increased motor traffic, which was causing expenditure of up to £IO,OOO a mile on roads. Mr. Jones considered that a savin in running costs of cars would enable motorists to pay £lO a year on their cars to have good roads, as against the present medium ones. New Zealand could not go on under the present system and he hoped the Government would go thoroughly into tin question at an early date and let die country know what it would cost to have reasonable roads.