POLITICAL NOTES.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2562, 30 September 1893, Page 2

POLITICAL NOTES.

It would be hard to find anywhere a better sample of the political turncoat than Mr H. S. Fish, M.H.R. When that gentleman went before the electors at Dunedin last election, he violently abused the Railway Commissioners for the stand they took during the strike. He gathered together all the ugly names and expletives his tongue was capable of and hurled them at the heads of the Commissioners. They were " the wicked three " —dreadful men—aud in short we believe at that time nothing less than tar and feathers and a horse whip for the Railway Commissioners would have appeased the angry Fish. In one of his political orations last election he said, iu speaking of the discharge of certain men from railway work, " The real reason for the discharge of these men was to help the capitalists —the Union Steamship Co. and others —by forcing them into the labor market, and so making available as many men as possible to take the place of unionists on strike. An engine driver of fourteen years' servico has just been dismissed simply because he asked his foreman if certain instructions were not violations of the rules, and demanded them iu writiug. If I were Minister of Public Works to-morrow the Commissioners would not again do as they have done." (Laughter and applause). This is the way Mr H. S. Fish talked in the old days to the working men, whose votes he was then soliciting.

But a change has come: Mr Fish has turned his coat, and his only excuse for so doing, ia that "circumstances have changed since thrqe years ago" The truth of the matter is that Mr Fish had his " comb cut" at last election, aud in consequence is having his revenge on the working man and his representatives. He was confident that the labor party would honor him with the head of the poll at Duuedin, instead of which they placed a working man—a cobbler—at the head, and left poor Fish to struggle in the best way he could. Mr Fish has never forgotten nor forgiven this blow ; nor the fact that his dream of being Minister of Public Works vanished. He now thinks the Railway Commissioners are not half bad fellows after all. He says "Although he had no wish to appear as an apologist f<>r the Railway Commissioners he thought theii management had not been so bad as to justify the House in passing a drastic Bill of this kind." Mr Fish niUßt unquestionably drop out of the realms of political life next election; for what with his opposition to the female franchise and his political coat turning, the ladies wont have him, neither will the working man. What then has he left? Nothing. He must return to his paintpot and brushes. Some men are born for great things, Some men are born for small; But of Fish it is not recorded Why he was born at all. Except he was to be a Btonewaller, and the country can well do without him in that eapacity.