ADDRESS-IN-REPLY.

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 152, 30 June 1927, Page 18

ADDRESS-IN-REPLY.

LONG DEBATE OPENED.

TWO FORMAL SPEECHES

SOME THREADBARE SUBJECTS,

(By Telegraph.—Parliamentary lieporlcr.) WELLINGTON, Wednesday. Immaculate in evening dress, the member for Napier (Mr. J. Mason) moved the Address-in-Ueply in the House this evening. The galleries were fairly well filled. The speech, though eloquently delivered, was uninspiring, since it was a patchwork of subjects threadbare with hard usage, varied with occasional extracts from handbooks and the New Zealand Year Book. For ten minutes the speaker dealt with the visit of the Duke and Duchess of York, moving easily to the Singapore base and New Zealand's proposed contribution of £1,000,000, or (3/9 per head of the population. After talking about Imperial trade preference, Mr. Mason jumped to the administration of Western Samoa, and made much of the fact that "the Government had taken prompt steps to deal with those who were stirring up trouble."

For a few minutes lie spoke of Communists, and next of criticism of the New Zealand Government. He declared that the Government could stand any amount of criticism. Picking up the Year Book, lie read out several pages of figures dealing with friendly societies, bank deposits, and the people's savings. The housing problem of ten years ago did not exist to-day, he declared, following this assertion with another to the effect that the financial position of New Zealand was sound. The need for offering attractive terms for the settlement of poor lands was stressed by Mr. Mason, whose next topics were main highways, access roads, the agricultural college, and free travelling on the railways for children under, six years. Having spoken for 4."> minutes, Mr. Mason reached unemployment and depression, by which time the Prime Minister had signed >two baskets of documents, another Minister had read two newspapers, three Reform members had gone to sleep, and the Leader of the Opposition had left the Chamber, probably , to employ his time more profitably in his office. When Mr. Speaker rang his little bell the mover was deep into immigration. The seconder was Mr. Adam Hamilton, member for Wallace, who also spoke for a full hour. He declared that there was sufficient on the Government's programme to keep the House busy till Christmas if all matters were, debated properly. There were thousands of unemployed to-day, but there were thousands of jobs that wanted doing. Some farmers • were ■ leaving their farms to seek jobs in town, and no one could blame them, because farmers were quite out of court when it came to a division of national profits. Farmers could not get labour on an economic basis, and thev were prepared to do without it. Meantime production suffered. Land values were not too high. In Southland land values were on a better basis than they had been for fifty years. High values in the cities had caused high production charges in the country. Farm incomes and farm assets had been, so far deflated that nobody wanted to go on the land. Mr. T. Fraser: What you are coming at is reduction in wages. Mr. Hamilton: That is what you would like me to say. (Laughter.) The remainder of the jpoecn followed on similar lines, the, speaker expressing sentiments which would have drawn applause at any Farmers' Union meeting. Drastic cases, lie said, required drastic remedies. Why not abolish protective tariffs and the Arbitration Court, and let farmers buy on the world's market? Another suggestion was that revenue from protective tariffs should be used to subsidise returns for primary products, since the income of farmers was only 23 to 33 per cent above pre-war standard, and the remainder of the community enjoyed an income 52 per cent above that standard. Why should it not be made illegal to collect a charge for any utility more than 33 per cent above pre-war rates? The House adjourned at 9.35 p.m.