WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Taihape Daily Times, 19 April 1918, Page 6

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

• THE SPECIAL SESSION* * A BUSY WEEK. WELLINGTON, April 17. The "business of the special session rwas put through at express speed and ;wlth much less friction than inost people expected. Even the most aggressive of the Labour members, whom will be readily identified by newspaper readers, attempted nothing in the way of wanton obstruction, and the Young New Zealand Party, which so far has little more than a nebulous existence, maintained for the mc::t part a discreet and dignified silence. The truth of the matter is the whole of the members were too much impressed by the gravity of the situation in Europe to lend themselves to tedious and futile debate. That sort of thing by common consent whs reserved for a more opportune season. Ministers on their side did not crowd the order paper unnecessarily with -contentious matter and were frank and conciliatory in their attitude towards reasonable criticism, NATIONAL SERVICE. The national service proposals which had' held up the Finance Bill on Saturday were expected to come down in a separate measure yesterday, but the Government on second thoughts decided to re-introduce them' as an amendment to the Bill by the Legislative Council. That the Upper House should readily lend itself to a device of this kind to limit the scope of discussion in the other chamber would have raised a vigorous protest in other circumstances, but as it was members simply smiled at the Governments ’ingenuity. The Labour Party, with a good deal of sympathy from members of the other parties, made an attempt to safeguard the workers against the possibility of being conscripted for private gain, but a large maojrity accepted the assurance of Mr. Massey and Sir Joseph Ward that ample protection against this kind of thing would be provided In the regulations and the Bill went through, thus completing the special work of the session. THE FINANCIAL POSITION. Sir Joseph Ward’s statement of the financial position of the. Dominion had the merit of being much more intelligible to the average reader than any Budget that has been presented to the House during the last forty years. It showed an increase of £1,633,371 in the ordinary revenue for,the year ended March 31st last and an increase of £238,446 in the ordinary expenditure, with a surplus, approximately, of four and a-half millions, bringing the accumulated surplus up to ten and three-quarter millions. There is no need, however, to repeat the published figures, A feature of the accounts that will give point to much of the criticism that has been levelled against the Railway Department during the last twelve months is the fact that while the revenue of the Department has decreased by £266,810 the expenditure has increased by £124,434. The policy of driving traffic from the lines appears to have produced just the results its critics have predicted. RESTRICTING IMPORTS. It seems to be due to Mr. L. M. Isitt as well as to the Hon. A. M, Myers to explain that the question put hy the member for Christchurch North to the Minister of Customs yesterday concerning the importation of alcoholic liquors during the course of the war was not intended to imply that the Minister was not acting with the greatest propriety in the matter. On more than one occasion Mr. Isitt has gone out of his way in the House and elsewhere to express his warm appreciation of Mr, Myers’ entire subjection of his own interests to those of the community in the discharge of his Ministerial duties. This is his attitude towards the Minister to-day. In asking his question he merely wished to fix the responsibility for the impor"tation of such large quantities of liquor and he could have put it to no one ■with more confidence of getting at the truth than to Mr, Myers, The relations between them are a fine exampie of two self-respecting men/ presumably holding widely different views, respecting one another.