PARLIAMENTARY NOTES.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 160, 8 July 1899, Page 2

PARLIAMENTARY NOTES.

(By Telegraph—Parliamentary Reporter.)

WELLINGTON, this day. GOVERNMENT INSURANCE DE-

PARTMENT

The annual report of the Government Insurance Commissioner, laid on the table yesterday, disclosed a satisfactory year's progress. For 1898 the income of the department for the year amounted to £410,148, of which £131,188 was contributed by interest. Both renewals and new premiums have increased, as also the amount !of interest earned. The expenses I were less than in 1898, in spite of the increase of business. The funds now stand at £2,861,534, and are anticipated to reach three millions sterling at the close of the current year. The chief features of interest in the bal-ance-sheet are a decrease of £ 55,727 in cash in hand and on current account; an increase of £41,943 in loans on policies; and an increase of £147,157 in freehold mortgages. The Commissioner states that six of the ship's company of the. Ohau were insured in the department. LANDS FOR SETTLEMENT. The Land for Settlement Act Amendment, introduced by Governor's message yesterday (Friday), provides that the existing Act shall continue in force until after the close of the first session of the next Parliament. The difficulty which arose last year in regard to the Hatuma Estate, as to the method of assessing the compensation payable in respect Of land compulsorily taken is removed by the specific provision that the compensation shall in every case have regard only to the fair actual market value of the land. The only other clause of importance in the' Bill, which, by the way, consists of only seven clauses, relates to the taking of land for workmen's homes within a borough or town district. It stateß that land may be taken for the purposes of workmen's homes or workmen's villages within a borough or town district, or within five miles of the boundary thereof, subject to the following conditions: ..(1) Not more than 100 acres shall be so taken in any one year within any one borough, or town district, or within five miles of the boundary thereof; (2) sections 7 and 8 of the principal Act shall nOt apply; (3) the owner shall have the right to retain out of land proposed to be so taken the area (if any) constituting the site upon which his dwellinghonse is erected together with the garden and ground surrounding same, not exceeding in the whole an area of five acres, provided that he. asserts such right in his claim under section 12 of principal Act and specifies in the claim the area situation and boundaries of the land in respect of which the right in asserted. NATIVE SCHOOLS. A paper presented yesterday shows j that the number of native schools in full working order at the end of 1898 was eighty, or six more than at the end of the previous year, while the number of children was 2972, an increase of 108. The report states as worthy of note that in some districts in which anti-European feeling was formerly very strong the desire for education is beginning to take hold of the natives. At the two boarding schools for Maori boys there Were at the end of the year 117 boys and a like number Of girls at the girls' boarding schools. The total expenditure on native schools was £22,591.

THE WORKERS COMPENSATION FOR ACCIDENTS BILL.

The Bill introduced this year into the Council under the above title is similar in most Tespects to the Bill of last session as it emerged from the Upper House. In two important particulars, however, it resembles the original Bill of last year rather than the amended measure.

In Committee the Council, it will be' remembered, struck put the clause making special provision for securing the injured workei compensation by; giving him a sort of first mortgage on the mine,faotory,building or vessel in which the injury occurred, and also that repealing those sections of the Coal Mine Act, 1891, and the Mining Act, 1898, which made an accident presumption of the owner's negligence, and arranged for the employees compensation. The two clauses in question have ben reinserted in the present Bill. The Council's amendment, making the proclamation of the Act contingent upon the establishment of State insurance against accidents is included in the measure. The general principle of . the Bill is to abolish contributory negligence, to make compensation for all accidents payable by employers with a contingent liability on the part of principals, contractors, sub-contractors and un-1 der the clause struck out last year owners of the property Upon which j accidents happen.. j In moving its second reading, the Minister of Education said that the Bill would not come into force until the Governor was satisfied that the Department established under the Go-. vernnient Insurance and Annuities Act, 1894, was carrying on the business of a_eid__-t insurance pursuant to statutory authority in that behalf. The bogey raised with reference to the alleged high premiums the Bill would necessitate was utterly exploded. In drafting the measure the Government had taken the machinery of the Imperial Act, and had applied the principles as universally as possible. They were strengthened in this attitude by i the experience gained from the working of the Imperial Act in the Old I I Country. The highest authorities in the United Kingdom were unanimous in their approval of the measure, and the only fault they found with it was its .leaving so many trades outside its operations. _ff its provisions were I just in the case of dangerous trades surely they were just in the case of all. AN ELECTIVE COUNCIL. A Bill to provide for an elective ' Legislative Council is being introduced iby Mr Pirani. It is practically identiI cal with a measure introduced by Sir j George Grey twenty years ago, which j recited it was "expedient and neces- | sary that there Should be in and for New Zealand an elective Executive Council." The Bill proposes to divide the colony into two electoral districts, I namely, the North and South Islands, and electors in the respective districts are to be those who are entitled to vote for memb&sj'of^the^House -Of Representatives. Maori members are to be elected by those of their own race and both native ancr 7 European members are to hold their seats for three years. The number of members to be elected from each island is left a blank. .