REPORT OF THE SELECT COMMITTEE ON REPORTING DEBATES.

Appendix to the Journals of the House of Representatives, 1866 Session I, F-03

REPORT OF THE SELECT COMMITTEE ON REPORTING DEBATES.

REPORT BKOUaHT TIP 13TH JULY, 1866, AND ORDERED TO BE PRINTED.

WELLINGTON.

1866.

P.—No. 3.

P.—No. 3

Yoru Committee have the honor to Report— That they have conferred with the Committee appointed by the Legislative Council, on the subject of the best mode of procuring accurate Reports of the Debates in both Houses of the Legislature. Two separate subjects have come under the consideration of the Committee. Ist. The best permanent arrangement for obtaining the object in view. 2nd. The best practicable means which can be adopted for the present Session. Two plans only have been proposed to the Committee. Ist. That as a permanent system the Government shall engage a staff of competent Reporters, under the control of an efficient chief; and that the reports furnished by them shall be printed at the Government Printing Office, or by a private firm, as may prove to be most economical. In order to provide for the circulation of such reports, it has been suggested that they should appear daily, and that a sufficient number of copies should be furnished to the newspapers of the Colony for distribution among their subscribers at such a cost as should induce the newspapers to circulate them instead of going to the expense of maintaining a reporting staff for themselves. Your Committee do not think that it would be desirable to enter upon such an arrangement, at all events for the present. 2nd. The second plan proposed has been, that for the present Session the newspapers shall undertake to furnish full and accurate reports daily of the proceedings in both Houses, and shall supply the Government with a certain number of copies of a reprint of such reports, published weekly, in an octavo form. Upon this subject your Committee have examined Messrs. Bull and McKenzie, and have invited these gentlemen to make a tender to the Committee of the rate at which they can afford to do this work. Messrs. Bull and McKenzie offer to produce such a work at the rate of £25 a sheet of sixteen pages, the Government to receive five hundred copies every Tuesday morning of the pamphlet containing the debates in both Houses during the previous week, the Government providing the paper," and the contractors undertaking the whole expense of reporting, printing, and completing the weekly pamphlet for circulation. They offer to print any additional number of copies for the Government at £3 for each two hundred and fifty copies, retaining the right to publish and sell any additional numbers on their private account. It is understood that under this arrangement the full reports shall appear every morning in the daily papers ; that slips of the speeches shall be furnished to each Member by nine o'clock every morning, and that if returned corrected by three o'clock the same day, such corrections shall be made in the reprinted copies of the debates; and further, that on the departure of steamers North and South, Members shall be furnished with corrected slips for distribution to the press in other parts of the Colony, of such of their speeches as shall not already have been included in the weekly pamphlet. According to the estimate made by the Government, the space which the reports in both Houses are likely to occupy is equal to seventy-two pages octavo, in double columns, per week; your Committee believe that the cost to the Colony of such an arrangement would not exceed £1,500 for a Session of thirteen weeks duration. The offer of Messrs. Bull and McKenzie appears to the Committee to provide the best means of reporting and printing the debates of the General Assembly for the present Session. James Edward FitzGerald, 13th July, 1866. Chairman.

REPOftT OF TIIE SELECT COMMITTEE ON REPORTING DEBATES.