The Daily News. THURSDAY, AUGUST 17, 1911. NEW ELECTORAL BOUNDARIES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 47, 17 August 1911, Page 4

The Daily News. THURSDAY, AUGUST 17, 1911. NEW ELECTORAL BOUNDARIES.

Owing to the slight increase of population in New Zealand, the movements of the people and the necessity of giving them a reasonably just, proportional representation in Parliament, the Electoral Commissioners have taken the map of New Zealand and carefully readjusted it into new sections for the purposes of Parliamentary and licensing elections. In the readjustment the South Island loses one seat (Taieri), giving the North Island an extra seat, and Raglan has been made an electorate. Representation in Parliament must be on the basis of population, and it is therefore certain that if the North Island continues to attract South Islanders more seats will be lost to the South as time goes on. Of greatest interest to sitting members is the fact that all sorts of odds and ends of other electorates have been added or subtracted, so that many members find themselves confronted with a situation that necessitates keen study. A whole nest of hot supporters may by the mathematical process adopted be cut clean away from an M.P., and he has therefore to woo strange electors who know him not and who may not desire to know him. In the North Island, because there is a greater concentration of people in cities, under present representation, a city (such as Wellington) obtains as many representatives in Parliament as four or five country electorates of huge, dimensions, lumped. If the people show an inclination to still flock to the cities, a very much too large proportion of our Parliament will be city men. On the whole, there is far less necessity for city members than country ones, but under the present system this increasing urban representation will continue. In the juggle some hotel licenses regarded hitherto as "safe" have disappeared. In the meantime, it is unlikely that sitting members will be particularly devoted to the work of the present session seeing that the new boundaries will complicate their work of appeal to the electors when Parliament closes its gates. Already (as may be gathered by the vigorous electioneering of Mr. Massey and others) available opportunities are being taken to interest the public in the coming struggle.