The Temuka Leader TUESDAY, JULY 3, 1888. THE WAYS OF THE WORLD.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1758, 3 July 1888, Page 2

The Temuka Leader TUESDAY, JULY 3, 1888. THE WAYS OF THE WORLD.

The groat M’Ellione, of New South Waits, has been making Parliamentary history for that colony. .Recently, when a proposal was before the House to buy out land for the purpose of widening a street, Mr M'Elboos characterised it as a swindle, and informed the House that Mr Garrett, the Minister of Linds, was one of those who hud fleeced the Government, in the tumuli «i hich ensued Mr M’Elhone vent home to bed, and left the House arguing the point till midnight. They first proposed to suspend him for the remainder of the silting, but as he had suspended himself this would be no punishment. The House then did not know what to do. All the copies of “ May’s Parliamentary Practices ” within reach were at once brought into requisilion, and a number of willing hands were prospecting for a precedent, but none turned up. The law required that Mr M'Ellione should first of all be given an opportunity to explain his conduct, and apologise, but he was not there to do it, and there the difficulty arose. At last Sir Henry Parkes, digging deep into the bowels of the “ Parliamentary Practices,” struck oil, and forthwith piocoeded to move “That Mr M’fiihone be arrested.” Though it was shown that it was illegal to take this course, the motion was carried after a tremendous debate, lusting well into the small hours, aud next day Mr M’E hono appeared as a prisoner. On appearing before the bar he is described as standing “in an attitude of truculent defiance.” He was not so rich as he used to be, he said, or else he would have •pent £IOOO in making the House smart for interfering witli him. is for the words he used in relation to Mr Garrett, they were quite true, and they all knew it. Pille Millu I The fat wss in the fire. The prisoner was not y«;t tamed. Ha had only mado matters worse, and be wa.ked out of the House. Tna whole aftsruoon was spent in discussing the subject, when Mr M'Ellione again swaggered in, and said he was sorry that instead of defying the chair he had not moved t.o refer tl,e mat ter to the Speaker, and turning toupd, and looking over his shoulder, sai *, "8 he walked out, “ That’s all you will get out of me.” And that was all they got, for after having spent two days and two nights wrangling over the question they had to admit they were beaten by Mr M’Edione. He n»ver withdrew the charge of “swindling” and “ fle-cin!'.” and never wi I. This is the same Mr M’Klhone who about three months ngo got a feaiful beating ip one of the rooms < f Parliament House, He a dispute with

another m-iuber, who followed him out of the House and gave him such a lhr<shing that hn was laid up for \ week. Of Buch stuff New South Wales legislators are made.

Sir Harry Atkinson played his cards splendidly with regard to the tea duty, lie made the tea duty conditional on granting subsidies to local bodies. It* was a oase of no tea duty no subsidies, >md by thus allocating the duty for a spocifi r purpose he placed members in an awkward fix. If they voted against the tea duty they would have the local bodies on the top of them, and if they voted for it they would have the working] man to deal with for throwing on them the burden of maintaining the poor. That is just now the position ; the poor people who have net enough to provide food for their own children must pay a duty on tes so as to provide chari ahle aid, nod relieve property of it. The subsidies which are provided out of the tea are given (o provide charitable aid, and thus the poor are taxed to maintain the poor. The majority of members voted in favor of the tea duty, no doubt because they were more afraid of the local bodies than of the wo king men, because they know how easily they can be gulled when the next election comes on. Mr Rhodes di.l not vote either for or against the tea duty.

Sir Harry had recourse to a little strategy lut Friday night, which, however, miscarried. There is in Parliament n few vnthnsiastic retrenchers, who have earned for themselves the soubriquet of >ha “ Skinflint ’’ committee. These have been going "through the Estimates and entting them down at a terrible rate, and they eay there is room for further reductions to the tune of £IOO,OOO. In their actions Sir Harry has smelt danger. H« has alienated himsoif from the Treotraders, and the Protectionists arc bound to him on'y until the tariff is passed. He therefore foresaw that if he went on with the tariff until it was passed the Skinflints would cut down his Estimates, and as the Protectionists would no longer be Inund to him ho wotrd bo defeated. He therefore decided on hanging up the tariff for a while, until he got the Estimatas-pasaad. He concluded that by doing so the Protectionists were hound to stick to him until tha tariff wes passed, bat th r *y did not, and the result was that he w>» defeated. He will bring on tha Estimates again this evening, and if he is beaten again there can be no doubt but that a crisis will arise, resulting peril spa in the resignation of the Ministry. It is remarkable too, that Mr Rhodes’ name does not appear i n the division list. Tha fact is that it is so long since he has been heard of that people are wondering what has become of him. Perhaps if is that be had so much weight in the House that he sank down through tho floor and has been lost sight of.

Th* action of the Government with regard to the Chinese' Conference held recently in Sydney is a beautiful simple of the muddling administration which has landed us in difficulties. It was decided to send the Hon. Mr Oliver as a delegate to the Conference, but the whole thing was over a week before he reached there. Was there ever such a muddle j The Government knew the date on which the Conference would bs held, jet such is their stupidity they did not send the delegate in time. As he was sent at all why w»s he not sent a week earlier, or when they did not send him in time wh it was the good of sending him at all 1 He was no doubt sent for a copy of the report, but I really think it could have been obtained at a cheaper race. There are two tbisgs about the Chinese question to whieh I would like to direct attention. Sir Henry Parke', Mr Scobie Mackenzie, and others who suffer severely from tba Jfreetrade rabies have gone almost off their beads en the Chinese question. They object, they say, to allow Chinamen to come into the colonies to compete with white labor. That is very good, really. If the Chinamen do the work in China and send their manufactured goods to this colony they have no objection to raise, but they will not allow Chinaim n to come into the colony and do the work here. Chinamen doing the work in this colony would consume some of our products, and help to pay taxation—Chinamen working in China consu.me none of our products, and give us no assistance to pay taxes. Our money goes to them to China, and we never got a penny of it back, yet Freetraders would not hesitate to allow the Chinese workmanship to come into the colony free, while they object to Chinese being allowed to come into the colony. It is hard to uuderstand them. Sir Henry Parkes is also the most, ranting, raving, anti-Home Kuler south of the line, but when the Imperial Government raised objections to his Chinese Immigration Bill recently he became very defiant, and said that all the ships-of-war of the British navy would not make him give way on this point. Here, then, is this man, who has been bragging of his loyalty ad nauseam for years, making use of very disloyal language because some little impediment was placed in his way in passing this Bill. If he were in Ireland, where he would not, and could not, have one word to say in the making of the laws, 1 should like to know how ho would feel, Gobi O’Lanus, K,C.M,G.