Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. FRIDAY, AUGUST 25, 1905. MR SEDDON AND THE LAND QUESTION.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume xxii, Issue 6657, 25 August 1905, Page 2

Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. FRIDAY, AUGUST 25, 1905. MR SEDDON AND THE LAND QUESTION.

The notice of motion which Mr Seddon placed before the House on Wednesday afternoon relating to the l<ind question is one of the most astonishing reversals of attitude that have ever been shown by a Government on a crucial question. We have heard a good deal in the past from the Premier on the necessity of preserving she leasehold system of land tedure, and of the unpatriotic character of those who proposed to allow Crown tenants to acquire the freehold of their properties. He has also frequently assured audiences that .there must be no tampering with the bargains already made between the State snl its tenantß by introducing any system of revaluation, and he has declared that the sanctity of these contracts must be observed at any price. All this determination of attitude the Premier has calmly laid on one side by his motion of Wednesday, and he now approaches the land question with an absolutely open mind. The appointment of the Land Comniissibn wis, as we, in common with others, remarked at the time, a shirking of the questioa on the part of the Government, and its establishment revealed plainly enough the fact that the Premier was not sure of his ground when called on to tackle the land question The Land Commission after exhaustive enquiries could come to no conclusion on the burning question of freehold v leasehold,and practically left the controversy where they found it. By his latest move in this matter Mr Seddon has frankly confessed that the Land Commision was a failure, and that he himself does not care to assume the responsibility of enunciating a policy on the critical question of land tenure, What he proposes to do now is to ask fora direction from the House on the subject, and to embody in a Bill whatever memberg decide on out of the medley of alternatives that he has laid before them. The Premier could not have chosen a more emphatic method of informing the public that he is afraid to adopt a decided policy oil the land question and to stand or fall by it. What the Premier is doing is practically equivalent to the touting for a further term of office. When dealing with the land question, he feels himself on slippery ground, and he i 3 apparoutly endeavouring to make his position secure by passing the task of forming a definito land policy on to the [louse. The discussion that will take place on the various clauses of bis motion will be a 'engthy one, and by the time it is finished a policy Bill will have been framed which will still not be the Government's policy Bill. It will go before the House as the House's own 13:11, aud if it ia rejected, then that will not be regarded as a blow to the Government. The latest move which Mr Seddon baa made may be political strategy, but we are unable to see that it can be dignified by the name of politics. Mr SodJon in the old age of his political life is evidently as skilful as ever; but he can hardly be ?aid to bo adding to the dignity of his rooord by adopting such measures as the one to which ha has now resorted in dealing with the lvad question. The only points - and they are not many—in Mr deddon's long list of fifteen clauses on which he displays no difficulty in making up hia mind are those of which the merits are no longer in dispute. The Premier has olectei to follow the line of least resistance in the hope that it may lead him away from a pressing danger, and we cannot con him on what one of his journalistic supporters terras his " unhoroic " conduce.