PARALIAMENTARY PARS.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 163, 12 July 1928, Page 22

PARALIAMENTARY PARS.

NOTES FROM THE GALLERY.

HOPE FOR COATES. (By Telegraph.—Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, Tuesday. "There's no other party in sight I can hitch up to,"' confessed Mr. W. D. Lysnar (Gisborne) in the House of .Representatives to-night. "I have hopes that Mr. Coates will develop into a good Prime Minister. (Laughter). But I know he is being pulled back. He has some people in his party and outside Parliament who are pulling him back, and preventing him from going forward." "Why do you hang on?" queried an amused Labour member. "I ain an Independent, and I am going to hang on to it," explained Mr. Lysnar, He hop<;d many. ' more Independents would get into Parliament to help tlie Prime Minister, or any party which desired to work in the country's interests. Too many Government members were tied. " Mr. 'J'. W. Rhodes: Aren't you tied? Mr. Lysnar: No, but the hon. gentleman is tied neck and crop, and tied by the hind leg. (Laughter). An Extraordinary Petition. A most unusual petition signed by William Alfred Hewitt, of 22, Mayfair Street, Lower Riccarton, superannuated railway employee, was presented by Mr. H. S. Kyle and read in the House by the clerk. The petitioner alleges that his former son-in-law, Robert Stewart Taylor, builder, of Fendalton, petitioned for divorce on the ground that his wife was of unsound mind and confined to a mental hospital. A decree nisi was granted in 1925. petitioner says that Taylor's evidence that his wife was mentally insane three months after marriage and had been continuously a person of uusound mind for seven years immediately preceding the filing of the divorce petition was false and uncorroborated. Taylor remarried in 1925. Petitioner alleges* that Taylor's father died in a mental hospital in 1923. He also says Taylor's evidence that the petitioner was "an alcoholic" is false and incapable of being proved. Also, petitioner says that additional false evidence was given by Taylor, who said that another daughter of petitioner was of unsound mind, and a deceased daughter a mental defective. These statements, petitioner alleges, are grossly untrue, improper and unjustiable, and should, he claims, be expunged from the records of the Divorce Court proceedings. The stigma is harder to bear because the living members of the family are daily moving amongst the public. Petitioner's health has been affected in consequence of the allegations, and he feels that he should make every effort to clear the family name of a stain undeservedly cast upon it. Petitioner asks that he be allowed to appear before a select committee to prove his statements. Family Allowance. There are many cases of defaulting husbands whose whereabouts are unknown and under the existing family allowance law no allowance can be granted in what are often very necessitous cases. Mr. A. Harris (Waitemata) has asked the Minister of Pensions if this session he will amend the Family Allowances Act to make provision that where a husband is unwilling or unable to make application for the allowance on behalf of hie children an application can be accepted from the wife.