The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 1929 ISHMAEL IN POLITICS

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 766, 12 September 1929, Page 8

The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 1929 ISHMAEL IN POLITICS

THE most piquant political news today is not the report from Wellington that Mr. J. S. Fletcher, United M.P. for Grey Lynn, made a terrible threat in the House of Representatives last evening to desert from the Government Party’s thin ranks and join the grinning Opposition if something better were not done quickly for the relief of unemployment. It is true that such a threat was amusing, but Mr. Fletcher did not, of course, cross the floor of the House. Real piquancy is found in the latest advice from Australia about the political crisis in the affairs and aggravations of the Federal Parliament. This is the rumour that the Rt. Hon. William Morris Hughes, P.C., still best known as “Billy,” will become the dynamic leader of a new party of malcontents— Radicals, rebels, and unhappy recruits from the Australian Labour Party both inside and outside Parliament—and declare war on the bifurcated Government Party and the Socialist remnant. So, meanwhile, throughout the Commonwealth, the political tom-toms are beating with the throb of excitement. Can Mr. Hughes, one of the great statesmen in the time of the World War, one of the peacemakers who were anything but blessed, come back to aggressive power, “terrible as an army with banners” ? The answer, at the moment and in the mist of conjecture, most appropriately has been supplied by Mr. Hughes himself in the form of an unrelated hit of the secret history of the Paris Peace Conference. There, on an occasion when peacemaking was not free of temper, the valiant man had a tilt at the late President Wilson because that idealist had suggested an “open trade door” to the present mandated islands in the South Pacific. Woodrow Wilson was then the loftiest statesman in the world—even bored boulevardiers rushed to look upon him with alert reverence—and he was not too tolerant of raucous criticism. Raising his fine voice in the hope of catching the better ear of Australia’s Prime Minister, the great American courteously remarked .- “Perhaps my friend, Mr. Hughes, did not hear all I said?” “P’r’aps not,” retorted Mr. Hughes with the aridity of an Australian drought. And there one has, in a phrase, the interesting political situation today in Australia. Perhaps Mr. Hughes again will rule in rage and dictatorial rigour, and then again “p’r’aps not.” He is getting on in years, like every warrior of a decade ago, hut time has not dulled his mental vigour “nor made stale his infinite variety” as a crafty political fighter. Today, some of his Conservative enemies, whose hatred is no weaker than his own, call him “a wrecker.” Possibly and even probably so, but the wrecker also can build politically with the hands of a cunning workman. And it is at least reasonable to suppose that he has wearied bitterly in the role of an Ishmael in the wilderness. It is reported that Mr. Hughes may raise a new standard — colour and device not disclosed, but preferably green, if there he anything at all in the theory of itinerant American psychologists, since that hue attracts money and power a-plenty—above a mixed party of disgruntled Labour members in the Canberra House of Representatives, discontented Socialists not in the inner circle of polities, and those former comrades who deserted him with curses when their fiery leader in wartime plumped for conscription and forthright patriotism. Though the Labour Opposition of 31 members in the House of Representatives has been vehemently confident in asserting its solidarity and that loyalty which is essential to the success of any party in polities, there apparently is some discontent and potential disloyalty within the Parliamentary Labour team. Certainly there is rivalry between its principal leaders. Mr. Seullin would be happy as Prime Minister, but he would he very miserable if Mr. Theodore secured the supreme position. Jealousy in the Labour group and dissension among the Nationalists and Country Party, who together have served as the Government for six years, hut never have agreed to party fusion, each holding its own caucuses, and fighting each other in uncertain electorates, represent a combination which manifestly is vulnerable. It is true that all parties have cursed Mr. Hughes, but all of them know quite well that he is a brilliant and ruthless fighter, and also that at heart he is an ultra-Radical who, among Tories, is like a hawk among pigeons. A DEPARTMENT GOES FISHING THE passion for regulating things is common to all Government departments, but this is not necessarily at the bottom of the new restrictions on trawling in the Hauraki Gulf. For a long time now there has been a growing belief that the trawlers have been responsible for the declining yield of fish from nearby waters. The neighbourhood of the Waitemata is not the fisherman’s paradise that it was of yore. Glowing tales are told of the immense catches that were secured from the wharves thirty and more years ago. Allowing for the natural enthusiasms of age, and the lustre that passing years add to the recitals of veterans, it seems clear that in a piscatorial sense the Waitemata is no longer the favoured spot it was; and when reasons for the falling off are sought, almost automatically the principal blame is ascribed to the trawlers. This may be simple justice. Yet at the same time there are other agencies at work. With the growth of a large city the waters become more and more polluted. The increasing maritime traffic hardly favours the maintenance of former standards. And while the trawlers, sweeping the floors of the gulf, have undoubtedly destroyed many of the organisms that made the gulf waters such a noted feeding ground for the creatures of the sea, the effects of the process cannot he regarded as total loss. Year in and year out the fishing organisations have contributed a staple article to Auckland’s food supply, but the fishermen themselves now realise and agree that a provident outlook demands attention to the need of conserving the resources for the future, though the method of doing it may ultimately make the public pay more for its fish. In another aspect of proposed regulations the Marine Department has far less justification. Indeed, its proposal to place limitations on the whitebait season, aud exact a fee from those engaged in marketing this popular delicacy, appears to be an unwarrantable interference with public rights. The idea of defining or regulating the whitebait season, when the whitebait themselves regulate it with such precision, is almost ludicrous. Even a Government department could hardly regard the whitebait as a sporting fish like the trout or the salmon, so the reason for artificial restrictions is quite obscure. Here, too, intervention must inevitably be followed by a rise in the price of the commodity. If the department could produce any evidence that it has made a serious study of the whitebait, a much clearer understanding of its motives would be possible. But the private life of the whitebait remains a mystery, just like the mystery of the impulses that sometimes stir Government departments to action.