POLITICS AND GOVERNMENT

New Zealand Listener, Volume 31, Issue 788, 27 August 1954, Page 15

POLITICS AND GOVERNMENT

HERE’S an old saying that every country gets the government it deserves. This is one of the points made by K. J. Scott, Senior Lecturer in Political Science at Victoria College, in a series of talks to be broadcast on the subject Aspects of Government in New Zealand. These talks are designed to examine the bases of our political system as a prelude to the General Elections which will be held later in the year. They will be broadcast from a link of the YA and YZ stations every Thursday at 9.15 p.m. for the next six

weeks. The first, on "Party Government," will be heard at 9.15 p.m, on Thursday, September 2. Mr. Scott (above) is mainly concerned with the practical aspects of governmen here, and his first four talks are devoted to an appraisal and criticism of the House of Representatives, Cabinet, Caucus, and the Public Service. In his last two talks he deals in general with the ideas of "Government by the People" and "Government by Discussion." Party government, he says, is the essence of democracy, since electors are | more interested in who is to govern them than in who is to represent them. He discusses the criticisms that it leads to instability in state policy, to class legislation and vote-catching legislation, The principal function of Parliament itself he sees as one of debate or talk, in which the ventilation of grievances guarantees purity of public administration. He criticises the low standard of talk in the House, and suggests as a desirable reform a larger membership. He concludes by saying that democracy is necessarily government by the majority, and that: only where there has been discussion is the majority more likely than the minority to be right, since discussion will have won waverers to the preferable view. Hence freedom ef discussion, and above all freedom of criticism, is an essential feature of democracy.