PARLIAMENTARY GOSSIP.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 224, 21 September 1929, Page 10

PARLIAMENTARY GOSSIP.

END OF A DULL WEEK. MUCH WASTE OF TIME. A DAY TO VOTE £1,034,369. (By Telegraph.—Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON", Friday. One of the slackest weeks of tlie session dragged to a close this afternoon in the House of Representatives, after a day spent in discussing and passing five classes of Estimates. The total sum involved Was £1,034, : 3'>9. The classes passed were: Police Department, £4p1,658; printing and stationery, £227,700; Mental Hospitals Department, £309,121; Department of Health, £247,737; Tourist and Health llesorts Department, £88,123. Several times during the day the Prime Minister appealed to the House to make progress with greater rapidity and less 'discussion, but his pleas fell on deaf ears, and shortly before 5.30 Sir Joseph had to I threaten that the House would sit after dinner if the Tourist Department's Estimates were not passed before the adjournment. This had the effect of bringing the .more talkative members to their senses. They stopped talking, the item was passed and the House rose for the long week-end rest, six minutes before the time, fixed by the Standing Orders. Women Police Patrols. Having set his face against the appointment of police women, the Minister of Justice is determined that he e'hall: not be moved on this subject. He said as much in the House of Representa-tives-to-day, when he announced that 1 a deputation representing the National Council of Women had arranged to wait on him next Wednesday morning. The ■council had intimated that the matter to be discussed was the desirability of appointing women police. "I am asked to appoint women police, but I say it cannot be done, because I . believe the women cannot take the oath Winnti*nr? n unlipo onnst.nTile." said the

I Hon. Miv Wilford. , He ■explained that I women patrols I would be different i from women police, I but those who | wanted women T police would not be ; satisfied with patj irols. In Auckland, when the National Council of Women ■met the Commissioner, it was pointed out that a Hon. T. Wilford. f° man could hot take the police oath, whereupon they as"ked that a modified form of oath he provided for police women. It seemed to the Minister that in the existing circumstances they were only playing about with a name. Mr. P. Eraser (Wellington Central): Could not the Minister appoint women patrols ? The Minister: It would -need special regulations. A Reform Member: You could create the machinery. / The Minister admitted that the machinery could be created for the appointment of women patrols, hut every one of the women's societies was asking for the appointment of women police, with .full powers, and lie declined to appoint them. -ilr. Coates: I think these women's patrols would satisfy the great majority. Immediately after this interlude the Police Department vote, which had- 'been discussed for some hours, was passed, whereupon Mr. Coates remarked: ..There you are! The item is through-! "Women .police settled it! (Laughter.) Extension of Dental Clinics. Several members having urged the extension of the school dental clinics system, the Minister of Health (Hon. A. J. Stallworthy) stated in the House today that the system was being ."enlarged as far as possible, and when the next: hatch of nurses had been turned out of the training school in Wellington further clinics could be staffed. Mr. Stallworthy said there,; had been a substantial increase in the number of dental clinics opened in recent years, the number having risen from 46 to 89 in —— - --- two years. UpHon. Stallworthy, Wards of f40,000! w a e being ex-: pended. The Government was very sympathetically disposed toward the system, and everything possible would be done to extend it in both town 'and country.

Crowded Mental Institutions. That a 'bill would foe 'brought down within the next few days so that relief might ; be given in overcrowded mental institutions was indicated by the Min-' ister in Charge of the Mental Hospitals Department, when his Estimates were under discussion in the House to-day. Nurses' Conditions. An unqualified was given to the House by the Minister of Health (Hon. A. J. Stall worthy) that he is anxious to improve working conditions of hospital nurses, who found many members willing to put in a friendly word for them, when the Health Department's Estimates were under consideration. The Minister declared that it was his privilege to secure some slight concession for nurses on the first day he took over the portfolio, and he had been actively engaged in constructive measures for improved, wages and conditions. He had issued an instruction in regard to St. Helen's nurses that information was to he collected to ascertain the practicability of giving them an eight-hour day and one day clear per week, with certain other amenities, if possible, having regard to the exigencies of the service.