The Sun WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 1927. HUMPTY-DUMPTY

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 215, 30 November 1927, Page 10

The Sun WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 1927. HUMPTY-DUMPTY

WHAT all the King’s horses and all the King’s men could not do in the fable, Mr. Coates lias clone in fact, The Prime Minister has put the Humpty-Dumpty of sessional politics the Licensing Amendment Bill—together again. It is to be set back on the wall, but in a slightly raffish condition. The House of Representatives will regain its right to determine, as it were, the difference between Humpty drunk and Dumpty sober, hi ora a national point of view the question is: Will the grotesque figure stay put on the wall or fall unbroken into the Statute Book as a splendid Yuletide gift to the Prohibitionists? - Though the opponents of the Liquor Trade will be stirred to a grateful belief that the prayers of the righteous availeth much even in politics, it is too early as yet to anticipate a complete legislative triumph. It is true that the Prime Minister somewhat sorrowfully has admitted the impossibility of a compromise on the vital question of the bare majority test at a poll with only two issues, but he has not spoken as an administrator having faith in the passage of the. national non-party measure he had to sponsor by virtue of his position as Leader of the House. As things appear in the open, the Bill, as already trimmed by the elected members of Parliament, ought logically to become the law of the land but, in the political game, it is the thing that is hidden which often confounds the' prophets. There are many turns in the legislative road. Those who take the trouble to read the Prime Minister’s careful and rather clever explanatory speech on the subject of restoring the Bill as a live order of the day, will note in some wonder the emphasis he has placed on the so-called obscurity of the situation when the House, in the committee stage of the measure, decided by 41 votes to 34 to report progress with leave to sit again. There may be nothing more in the statement than the message it carries on its face, but the words seem to hold an inner meaning. It is pointed out that, in the interval since the Bill was laid in splints many members have stated very definitely to Mr. Coates their view that had the effect of the vote to report progress been thoroughly understood by them “they would have felt it necessary to vote in a different manner and it is doubtful whether progress would have been reported had these members voted in accordance with what they now declare to be their conviction.”

These words are emphasised here for the purpose of drawing attention to their real meaning. llow are they to be interpreted? One naturally, hesitates to infer that any of the many members who did not thoroughly understand the situation then would now vote differently. There is an ugly word for that sort of conduct, and it will be used vigorously in the future if there be reason for its use. If members do not understand what a division on a question to report progress means in practice, they are not competent to sit in Parliament. They had better realise now what the result of the misunderstood division means in principle. In the meantime, discussion on the Bill is to be resumed on the clear understanding that the Prime Minister has divested himself of all further responsibility for its passage in its altered form. He will put Humpty-Dumpty on the wall again, but refuses to hold him or it up. Safety first and last is a wise policy in politics, but it is to be hoped that Parliament as a whole will tackle an embarrassing task with courage and completeness, and, one way or another, make an end to an exasperating controversy and a long political shuffle.