PANTOMIME IN PARLIAMENT.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume xxix, Issue 7241, 29 July 1907, Page 1

PANTOMIME IN PARLIAMENT.

To quote an inelegant expression used by Mr A. Rutherford, in the House of Representatives yesterday, . members childishly wasted their time in " acting the goat." The user of the phrase and otheis gentlemen who, for the time, were posing as merry-andrews gave the taxpayers a poor return for the money paid in salaries. Instead of discharging the country's business with 'whatever ability they possessed, certain legislators thought that the people were pining for heavy comedy, but unfortunately, the actors we're less'fitted for the art of fun-making than for law-making, and therefore their elephantine gambols in the z-ealms of Harlequin were merely painfully pathetic. Ostensibly the members were concerned about the scope of the Noxious Weeds Bill—whether its provisions should have force in one or more provinces—but by their methods of debate they would lead the public to believe that the first area to be gazetted under the" Act should be the House of Representatives. The real object of yesterday's puerile "stonewall" was to block a couple of Bills, for the abolition of the duty on flour" and the abolition of plural voting, of which Mr Hogg had charge, but the tac- ' tics of the obstructors were as fatuous as their purpose. Without entering into the merits of tho measures proposed by Mr Hogg, it. may be said that no reform should know this better than gentlemen of this twentieth century, whom tlie electors have deemed fit to represent them'in the-King's Parliament. Possibly the members, surprised at their comparative moderation in the debates on the Address-in-Reply and the Budget, though that they were entitled to some relaxation; but this would be a poor excuse to offer for yesterday's expensive farco,#'or which the colony has to pay. Certainly the "rot and rubbish," as Mr Hall'termed the nonsense, will do much to discount any good opinion that the public had formed about Parliament's procedure earlier in the session.- "We have witnessed a: display this afternoon which stands—l am glad to say—without parallel in this or any previous Parliament," stated Mr Hogg, and his comment is justified by tlie lamentable event.—Evening Post, July 26.