WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, 26 June 1917, Page 6

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

/PROHIBITED VOLUNTARY ENLISTMENT. THE FIRST DIVISION. (From Our Own Correspondent). Wellington, June 22. The prohibition of voluntary enlistment so far as members of the First Division are concerned is being attributed by some people to a desire on the part of the Minister of Defence to place the ignomy of compulsion, as his critics put it, \ipon those single men who have •not seen their duty to the Empire till the eleventh hour. This is quite incorrect and plainly unjust to Sir James ■Allen. The Minister has studiously avoided, so far as possible, making any distinction between voluntary and ballotted recruits and has never officially 'implied that the man going into camp 'Wider the one system is doing his duty more fully than the one going in under ■the other. But the arrangement by' •which the two systems have been running side by side has occasioned a good deal of unnecessary trouble and expense, to say nothing of confusion, and with the exhaustion of the First Division in sight Sir James considered the voluntary sysafter adequate notice, might be discontinued without disadvantage to anyone. THE SECOND DIVISION. From present appearances it seems likely that several of the early classes in the Second Division will be required for service at the front and it is very natural that the men included in these classes should be agitating for better pay for themselves and more generous provision for their dependents. So far the Government has given no indication of its attitude towards the demands that are being made upon it in this respect, and of course, will give none till Mr. Massey and Sir Joseph Ward are back in the Dominion; but it is fairly certain that when the question comes up in Parliament •a large majority of the private members will be found on the side of the agitators. Two years ago some of the more daring spirits in the House were severely rebuked from the ministerial benches for ■suggesting "union rates of pay" for soldiers, but public opinion has developed [•quickly and gone far since then and Ministers, perforce, have moved along not •far in the rear of the crowd. THE RETURNING MINISTERS. Speculation as to the return of the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance is now reduced to such narrow limits that no one can go very far astray in fixing the momentous day. It was stated some time ago that after voting Supply next week Parliament would adjourn for a fortnight or so in order to allow the travellers time to gather up the reins of their Departments and to 'put the finishing touches to their measures for tho sessions, but Sir James Allen, than whom no one can know better, says any delay of this kind will be unnecessary. The public, if one may judge from the outward and visible signs to be seen everwhere, is less anxious to learn what the Government is going to do next than it is to hear what its leaders have been doing while they have been away. WHEAT. The deputation that came down to Wellington from the Wairarapa district to interview the Minister of Agriculture •the other day plainly had a very real grievance against someone in authority. The farmers whom the deputation represented had been led to believe that if they would sow part of their holdings in wheat the Government, in addition to guaranteeing them a good paying price for their crop, would gitfe them every •possible assistance in procuring suitable seed and labor-saving appliances. On •this understanding they set about ploughing up their land, as a practical expression of their patriotism, and now have some 1500 acres lying fallow. But •apparently seed is available only from private dealers at Ss Od or 0s Cd a bushel ■and even then not of the quality or of the description required. No doubt Mr. Mac Donald will set matters right, as lie has a habit of doing, but some of the officers of his Department must have been altogether out of sympathy with the spirit of his scheme. THE MEMBER FOR T-lAWKE'S BAY. It is obvious enough now that the new member 'for Hawke's Bay is not going to be dragged at the chariot wheels of the National Government. When he consented at the urgent request of the Liberal members of tho Cabinet to contest the seat rendered vacant by the death of Dr. McNab, it was naturally assumed by peonle who did not know him very well that a nortfolio was among the inducements drawing him back to public life His intimate friends were under no such delusion. They were well aware that lie hankered after neither tho substance nor the tinsel of office and that his inclination lay in quite another direction. That he is determined to be free from the, trammels of party he made perfeetlv clear during Ilia election campaign and that lie intends to play the part of a candid friend to the National Government he made equally plain when addressing a section' of his constituents the other day. 'ASSERTION OF INDEPENDENCE. Whether or not Sir John Findlay would have been an acceptable colleague to the Reform members of the Cabinet is a question it would be idle to discuss in view of recent events. The interview which the Attorney-General gave to the newspapers criticising Sir John's action in impugning the War Regulations in his professional capacity dissipated all possibility of tlicir feelings on the subject being put to the test It still would be interesting, however, to learn how some of the 'Liberal Ministers would regard his appearance on the treasury benches. Presumably he was invited to second the motion for the Address-in-Reply in pursuance of the custom which prescribes that newly elected members shall be pushed into prominence on such occasions; but a curious public has not been permitted to know the nature of liis reply. THE 'DEMOCRATIC NOTE. The particular business which took the Hastings deputation to Sir .John is at the moment of less consequence than the emphatic reiteration of his democratic principles. He is not generally supposed to be a rabid opponent of the "trade" nor an ardent friend of the prohibitionists. What views he has on the liquor question, merely as a social problem, are his own and have not been paraded before the public. But arguing from the purely democratic standpoint he maintains that the voice of the people ought to prevail here as it ought to prevail everywhere else. Holding this view ho 'U 'Eerhajiß a. little' illogical in iwiiittlng.

down the majority required to obtain no-license to *55 per cent, and then saving the process shall go no further. Bub other good democrats are beginning to Realise that without the stability obtained from a strong volume of public opinion no social reform can achieve the best results.

THE FUTURE. , But whatever his disposition towards the parties and their leaders or towards any particular political question may 'be, there is not the slightest ground for the assumption that' Sir John is to inaugurate a militant movement against the National Government. On this point he has given an emphatic pledge which he mal be trusted to respect. But both by precept and example he jirobariv will inspire the rank and file of the House of Representatives with a little more courage and enterprise and independence than they have displayed since they offered up their party differences on the high altar of national patriotism. Here he may do a very real and important service to the State. The friends of both parties and the friends of no party at all aTe beginning to recognise that without free and honest criticism legislation and administration are apt to deteriorate. It is from this peril Sir John may assist in saying the country. •CALLOUS BEHAVIOUR. Surprise is expressed at the latest action of the Justice Department in connection with the prisoner rvflfo was operated upon at Auckland recently for the removal of pressure from the brain. It will be remembered that this prisoner, who is a young man under a life sentence for attempted murder, is believed by the medical men to have been given an abnormal criminal bent by a fall which injured his skull in childhood days. There seemed reason to believe that the lifting of a ipiece of bone in tlfe skull would make him normal morally, and with his own'consent and the consent of his relatives the operation was undertaken in the Auckland Hospital. It was a very serious operation, but it was successful. But now, while the patient is far from recovered, the prison authorities have taken him from the hospital, in spite of the protests of the medical men there, and have placed him back in gaol, where the facilities for treating' a case of the kind cannot be great, In response to a protest the Justice Department instructed an Auckland surgeon to examine the man in consultation with the gaol doctor: The surgeon reported that the patient did not appear to have suffered by removal and that fa any case he had better not be moved again just now. The relatives are indignant. They insist that if the Justice Department was prepared to let the man face a delicate and dangerous operation in the hope of restoring him to moral health, the officials should have been prepared to let, the patient have a decent chance of full recovery under more favorable surroundings than j a gaol can provide.