The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 1897. THE IMMACULATE OPPOSITION.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVIII, Issue 254, 2 November 1897, Page 4

The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo.

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 1897. THE IMMACULATE OPPOSITION.

For tho cause that lades assistance, For tha vrong that needs resistance, For the futuro in the distance, And tho good that tto can do.

There is at least one privilege of which the members of the Opposition must admit they still retain undisturbed possession — the privilege of abusing- the party in power. Whatever injustice the Government has been guilty of it has never sought to deprive them of that; and they on their part have displayed a full recognition of the concession by taking the fullest advantage of it. It has certainly not been for lack of Argus eyes and ready tongues to detect and exx>ose its shortcoming's that the pre-' sent administration has preserved a fair reputation before the country. If misrepresentation and villification could have unseated the present party it would have been done long' ago; and in the same way if the mere arrogating- to it-self of the entire stock of parliamentary honesty and purity could have placed the Opposition in power Captain Russell and his friends would to-day be guiding- the affairs of the colony. Such tactics have doubtless been, more or less, resorted to by Oppositions time out of mind, and the public have learned to appraise the attacks at pretty much their true value. Inside the Chamber there is always the opportunity of hearing- both sides of a question and of making full allowance for the not altogether impartial complexion with which party feeling is almost certain to invest it.

Outside the House, although there do not exist the same opportunities for discriminating' between truth and falsehood, still the public have trusted to the newspapers to give an unbiassed account oi; what takes place in the Assembly. Whatever the politics of a newspaper may be it has always been regarded as a point of honour that it should present its readers with a truthful reflection of the proceedings in Parliament. In its leading1 columns it is at liberty to express its individual opinion, but its reports, if they are to be worth anything-, should be a plain unvarnished statement of facts. Its readers know perfectly well that the editorial column is an expression of opinion, and they accept or reject the views it contains according- to their own convictions. The news columns, however, they approach in quite another spirit. To these they look for information that shall as nearly as possible be photographic in its correctness. Of course, it must occasionally happen as in a photograph that the image is distorted, but the public rest satisfied in the assurance that it is never wilfully distorted. To that confidence which it has consistently respected the British press owes its unrivalled

position and success; and we should be sorry to think that in these colonies any section of it would do anything to forfeit that confidence. We have heard it said that there is some excuse for misrepresentation in political matters; but we indignantly deny that there is any excuse in any matter. A paper that can deliberately prostitute its news columns to political misrepresentation will scarcely shrink from the same tactics in municipal affairs; and it is not difficult to conceive that such paltering" with the truth must end in the utter unreliability of any report it may print.

Some of the Opposition papers seem in their political zeal to have gone perilously near to forfeiting the confidence of the public by their fashion of dressing- up the reports of the Parliamentary debates. Over and over again have we been told that it was the Liberal papers that lent themselves indiscriminately for party uses. It was a favourite accusation of Sir Eobert Stout's, echoed by the opponents of the Government generally, that newspapers of the right colour were purchased by means of big advertisements by the Government; and although the charge was clearly disproved in the House by a comparison of the Government advertisements inserted in the different papers of the colony, Sir Robert has still the effrontery to repeat it. The Opposition journals have posed as the incarnation of impartiality, and the public were earnestly advised to seek for truth only in their pages. They never misrepresented like the Government organs; they would not lend themselves to such conduct.

It has been reserved for a quite impartial critic to expose the utter hollowness of this assumption of impartiality on the part of the Opposition press. The Press Association is an entirely non-political body as everybody is doubtless aware. In its reports of the proceedings in the House it gives no preference to one side of the chamber or the other, and the same reports are sent to the journals of the colony, irrespective of their politics. For some time past, however, it has been noticeable that while the Press Association report in Liberal papers appears in one form, in the columns of Opposition organs it appears in another. The language may not be absolutely altered, but prominence is given to the speeches and arguments of the Opposition, while those of the Government are often dismissed in a few lines. The impression thus conveyed to the average reader, who is all unconscious of the unfair curtailment that the report has undergone in the editor's hands is quite a false one, for there is nothing to tell him that the report does not represent the actual proceedings in the Chamber, if not in extenso, at any rate not cut down in one part more than in another to advance party ends. The members of the House were of course quick to notice this curious tinkering in the Press Association reports, and some of them were inclined to fix the blame on the Association. That there may be no misapprehension as to where the fault really lies, tliere has just been drawn up a thoroughly reliable analysis which speaks for itself. We submit it in full for the edification —and shall we say amusement of our readers? Taking the present session we find that in the case of the Address-in-lleply 35 speeches by Government supporters and 25 by members of the Opposition were reported in the 'Lyttelton Times,' which devoted 143 inches to the Government speakers and 99 inches to the Opposition, or on on average 3.6S inches to each Government speaker and 3.99 to each Opposition . speaker. The 'Christckurch Press,' the organ of the Opposition, gave to 40 Government speeches 126 inches and to 25 Opposition speeches 135J inches, or an average of 3.15 inches to Ministerialists and G. 22 inches to Oppositionists. The Auckland 'Herald,' dealing with the same part of the Parliamentary proceed-. ings, gave to 40 Ministerialist speeches 6~-\ inches, or an average of 1.69 inches to each speaker, and to 25 Opposition speeches 58| inches, or an average of 2.33 inches per speaker. In the debate on the Financial Statement on the 20th October the 'Lyttelton Times' gave to 12 speeches of the Opposition 57§ inches and to 11 speeches of the Government 48§ inches, or an average of 4.TS inches to each Oppositionist and of 4.42 inches to each Government supporter. In the same debate the 'Christchurch Press' gave the Opposition 12 speeches 55| inches, and Government 11 speeches 22J inches, or an average of 4.G2 inches to every Opposition orator, while the poor Government members got only 2.8 inches. At the same time the Auckland 'Herald' made room for 6 Opposition speakers to the extent of 23J- inches, while the 7 speakers on the Government side were cut off with 11| inches. The average in that case was —Opposition speakers, 3.55 inches; Government speakers, 1.65. After seeing these figures we think our readers will feel less inclined than ever to put much faith in the boasted impartiality of the Opposition press. We might comment at length on such an unwarrantable abuse of public confidence as is here displayed, but the facts as they stand reqiiire no driving home.