SPEAKER AND PRESS

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10708, 31 August 1912, Page 5

SPEAKER AND PRESS

CABLE NEWS

(United Freti Asmiation— Bg EUfr trie Telegraph—Copyright.).

NEW ZEALAND PRECEDENT QUOTED: EXCLUSION* OF xAESS REPRESENTATIVES.

(Rectivc-d Last Night, 9.20 o'clock.)

SYDNEY, August 30

Speaker Willis, in a statement to the Presf.' v regarding the exclusion of representatives of the # Daily Telegraph from the Press gallery, said that the country has suffered from the usurption ,of authority, which the Press has exercised over the representatives of the.people. In the exercise of his duty the Speaker must be fearless, and irrespective of parties, order and discipline must he enforced, as freedom of speech was not unbridled oratory. He quotes a communication from the New Zealand Hansard , Office supporting the authority of "the Speaker over admission to the Preris gallery. The writer recalled the time when Mr O'Rourko excluded from the gallery and Parliamentary precincts a reporter- who, when a member asked him if he had a right to be in the members' . lobby replied: "If you are a messenger, put a uniform on, before address- j ing me." The writer says there were other cases of which he had personal J knowledge, including the exclusion of ! a newspaper correspondent, for reflect- 1 ing upo:i' the members in his news. Mr j Willis concludes by stating that the j New Zealand precedent shows that the Press miu't not presume to ride rough-shod over the Speaker. j