SESSION INCIDENTS

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 445, 29 August 1928, Page 16

SESSION INCIDENTS

Queries and Asides - 4

(THE SUN'S Parliamentary Reporter.)

WELLINGTON, Tuesday. Parliament, on reassembling yesterday, was greeted with several departmental reports of greater or lesser importance. The Prisons Report for the most part drew warm praise, even from the Labour side of the House, and Mr. P. Fraser’s commendation of the work of Mr. B. L. Dallard, controller of prisons, must have been gratifying to Mr. Dallard, who was listening to the discussion. The report of the proceedings of the National Industrial Conference, together with the Prime Minister’s comments thereon, was produced early in the afternoon by Mr. Coates, at whose suggestion discussion on the documents concerned was deferred until Thursday. Mr. Coates announced that another industrial conference would be held during summer, and that in the meantime the present legislation would remain in force. * Mr. Tapley Returns Sartorial lustre is added to the House by the return of Mr. H. L. Tapley, another wayfarer who * has been spending several months abroad. If he has no other claim to distinction-, Mr. Tapley is at least one of the bestdressed men in the House, the others being Mr. W. S. Glenn, Mr. A. M. Samuel, and that political Beau Brummel, the Prime Minister. % * *

First Day at School First days at a boarding school are the well-remembered days of initiation ceremonies; but these simple ceremonies are often painful, sometimes dangerous. Thus a new boarder at Wanganui Technical College was dropped on to a concrete floor early this year, and seriously injured his hip. As the College Board has declined to acknowledge responsibility, the father, a Taumarunui farmer, is petitioning Parliament. * * * Hutt Borough’s Burden

How the Hutt Borough Council is paying £4OO a month in hospital levies was described by Mr. T. *M. Wilford, when he said the present system of placing the burden of hospital taxation on local bodies was outrageous. The Minister (the Hon. J. A. Young) said there was no present intention to alter the system. Local bodies were the people through whom the levies could most satisfactorily be collected. * * * Hands Off the Dead “Hands off the dead” is the cry of petitioners protesting against the Wellington City Council’s proposal to put a road through the Bowen Street Cemetery, where scores of pioneers are at rest. Sir R. D. D. McLean is the first signatory to the big petition, afc xt A Literal Truth Mr. D. Jones drew fire from Labour ranks during discussion of the Post Post and Telegraph Bill last evening. Mr. Savage, he said, had once remarked that all the Minister of Finance had to do was to draw cheques. Mr. Savage: I have never made any such statement. I defy Mr. Jones to quote Hansard. Mr. Jones: You might have deleted it from your Hansard. Mr. Savage raised a protest against the imputation that he cut something out of his Hansard, and Mr. Jones

withdrew, saying that though Mr. Savage might not do so every other member did. .

Mr. Fraser objected to this, saying that Mr. Jones was trifling with the rules of the House. The Speaker said that Mr. Jones was doubtless speaking a literal truth. Mr. Jones said that he was willing to withdraw. m m Other petitions presented to-day include another about euchre tournaments, presented by Mr. Sullivan, the first signatory being W. Cooper, hon. secretary Woolston Library committee. A petition presented by Mr. Tau Henare asks for a railway siding at Karaha, 157 miles North of Auckland, and a petition presented by Mr. J. S. Dickson voices the anguish of a large number of Aucklanders over the present incidence of motor taxation. * Work on Rangitoto “I feel that I would be failing in my duty if I did not record the excellent work accomplished by the Prisons Departmetn on Rangitoto Island,” said Mr. A. Harris (Waitemata) to-day. The department, he added, was entitled to warm congratulation. * Sfc * Bolsheviks! Mr. Jones strongly criticised the Labour Party’s attitude and the Marxian theories of the Opposition leader in particular. Mr. Parry: Call us Bolsheviks. Mr. Jones: If you like to class your leader with Bolsheviks, that is your business. The Speaker: Order! Order! War-time Wheat Mr. D. G. Sullivan referred to Mr Jones as the man who once, in wartime, appealed to Canterbury farmers not to grow wheat unless they got their price. Mr. Jones: That statement is absolutely without foundation, and no evidence can be found to support it. During the war I was a large wheatgrower and played a large part at many conferences in endeavourng- to secure a moderate price for wheat. * •* * Prison Discipline Discussion of the annual report of the Prisons Department occupied the whole of the afternoon, speakers generally eulogising the improvement which had taken place in prison reform during recent years. The Minister, in reply, said that the main purpose of the prison was reformation, but it could not be administered without a certain amount of discipline and authority. He paid tribute to prison officers and to voluntary workers who have laboured for the benefit of prisoners. « Sfc » Public Works Consolidation

In the evening the Public Works Act Amendment Bill was introduced. The Minister of Public Works explained that it was intended to introduce a consolidation of the Public Works Act before the end of the session, and there were some amendments they desired to get into the consolidation. They referred principally to the dedication of lands, streets, etc. The Bill was read a first time.