PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10704, 27 August 1912, Page 7

PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION

DEPUTATION TO THE PBEMIER

(By Telegraph — Press Association.J

WELLINGTON. Last Ni^ht,

A large deputation waited on the Hon W. F. Massey (Prime Minist-.-r) to-day, to urge the Government to adopt the proportional system 01 representation.

Jn reply, the Premier said ho was very pleased to listen to tlio representations of the deputation. It was no doubt known to them that for some time past he had boon .1 student of the system of proportional representation, and on the- whole he was prepared to say it was .ioari-r perfection than any other system, lie knew of. It was scarcely necessary for him to refer to the Second Ballot Act. It had been condemned, and was practically as dead as Julius Caesar. He -agreed that under a system of (proportional representation minorities would bo represented. That the GovI ernmont was sympathetic to the j-.ro- \ portional system, v.-as evidenced by the fact that it had been applied i;i connection with the measure now before the Legislative Council. However, what the Government was prepared to do would depend on the fate of that measure, and he hoped the Bill would be passed into law; but until that time, and until the fate of the Bill was known, it would be im- | possible for the Government to say what it would do. Ho agreed that the suggestion made by Mr Atkinson that the system should be applied, as an Enabling Bill, and not as a compulsory measure, to local bodies, was i( good one. The idea had not previously struck him; but it commended itself to him, and he would have very great pleasure, in communicating their representations to his colleagues. Beyond that, he could not make a definite statement; but he hoped and believed that the deputation would be productive of fjood results.