MR J. HOLMES AT ASHBURTON.

Press, Volume L, Issue 8650, 27 November 1893, Page 3

MR J. HOLMES AT ASHBURTON.

Mr John Holmes delivered an address at Ashburtoti on Saturday, at the Odd- | fellows' Hall, and commenced at 3 o'clock i in the afternoon. There was a large atj tendance, a number of ladies also being present. Mr M. Stitt presided, and briefly ! opened the meeting. j Mr Holmes, who was applauded on j rising, prefaced hi«> remarks by telling his audience that he was a Liberal of the Jeremy Benthatn, John Bright, and John | Stuart Mill type, an j that iv the course of ! his speech he would show that Liberalism | was not a changeable thing based ou trust | in the people, but was a policy of Governi ment for all time, based upon immutable | principles of equality before the laws, of liberty, of justice to all men, without class laws or distinctions. (Applause.) He desired to point out that the so called Liberalism of the present day departed from what was known as honest or moderate Liberalism. If they had taken any notice of what he had written to the papers, they would see that he had challenged the claims of those who I called themselves Liberals here, that they had abandoned in their legislation the I whole of the principles of Liberalism. But they had found them-elves a hew name, and called themselves Progressive Liberals. I That term meant nothing less and nothing I more than lop-sided Socialism. (Applause.) They were lop-sided Socialists, whose whole policy was to destroy freehold tenure ; to nationalise the land an it was I called ; to make every man who lived on the laud the mere tenant of the state. (Applause.) Mr Ballance's policy was, that the people of the towns might be able to participate in all the prosperity that the farmers enjoyed, but there was no responsive idea that the people iv the country were to participate in the welfare of the towus. (Hear, hear.) That was what was the so - called Progressive Liberalism, and what, with their permission, he would call lop-sided Socialism. (A Voice—"No, nc.) Under the true principles of Liberalism equality of sacrifice was one of its leadiug doctrines, and that doctrine he would apply to the question of TAXATION. He had been telling tuemwhat Liberalism was; he was not giving them shoddy Liberalism. (Hear,, hear.) The old English ideas about Liberalism had been modified and improved until we came to the present, when the principles had been studied by the ablest men in the world, that was in Great Britain. They held that taxation should be fair and should be just to all. This was known as equality of sacrifice —that amau should pay according to what he possessed ; that the man who had more should pay more in proportion to what he possessed. When the property tax was imposed by a previous Government all who were honest Liberals said uo to it, because it fell short of the principle of Liberalism and equality of sacrifice. (Applause.) Those who were honest Liberals said it w_s a wrong system of taxation, but what did they suggest iv its place f They suggested the land and income tax, and if it had been fairly, honourably and honestly administered no man iv the community should grnmble, whether he was a millionaire or as poor as himself. (Laughter and applause.) He would show that the Government, had abandoned the just and right principles of taxation and bad brought in most unjust, most unfair and most iniquitous taxation that was ever imposed upon any j free people in any colony under j the British Crown. It reminded him of the Catholic doctrine, that it was not safe to put the Bible in the hands of children aud incapables as they might make use of that noble book for evil purposes, so it was with the land and income tax, which was the best system of taxation, but had been grossly misused by a Government of incapables, and perhaps worse. (Applause). Mr Reeves in his speech of Friday night, and it had been .stated in a programme sent out to farmers, that it was untrue that a man having £20,000 worth of hotel property standing on land worth £2000 had to pay no more than about £8 per year taxation.. If a mart Whose property was worth £2000 had an hotel, or if aay worth £20,000, which gave a rental of £2000. with an ineomefrom other businesses of £300 a year, he paid £82 10s in taxation. Now he (the speaker) wanted to show them such was not the case. Supposing a man had £20,000 worth of property, which he let, and received a rental of £2000 a year, and waß enabled to carry on some other business at which he earned say £300 a year, the total tax he would have topay would be £S. (A Voice —"Gammon.") He knew that there was nothing which perhaps would convince them more than a lawyer's little bill—(Laughter)— and what he spoke upon was authority. He spoke upon authority, and he challenged Mr W. P. Beeves to place the two opinions with three of the ablest lawyers in the colony, say Messrs Heskett, Stout, and Stringer, and he (the speaker) would abide by the consequences. If he were wrong he would pay the costs, and if he were right then Mr Reeves should pay them. (Applause.) Supposing a man were to buy from Mr Thomas, who he saw at the meeting, a suburban property, worth £'.#OO, on which he erected a building worth £20,000, £30,000, £40,000 or even £50,000, under the present land and income tax as amended last sessiou he would pay upon the unimproved value of the land of £2000, ld in the £, which would be about £8 per annum. The whole £50,000 in buildings was exempt. That, was the case under the Land and Income Tax Assessment Act Amendment Act, 1893, No. 33. That was the case of the man of town property. Now he would take the case of the man who had, say, 300 acres of land worth a total of £9000. Under the same Act he had to pay on the unimproved value of the land. Allow him £1000 for improvements and £1000 for stock, and then he had to pay Id in the £ upon the £9000. He had to pay £37 10s, and in addition was called a social pest, besides having to pay a progressive tax upon the £9000. lt would be giving a big margin to say the country man had an, income of £700 or -€800 a year, yet he would have to pay some £39 under the system of progressive taxation, while the man in town, holding a large property and earning an additional income, would only have to pay £8. And that was what was called equality of sacrifice. The man who aaid it was all rot he was prepared to challenge; allow him to put the matter before any lawyer of standing in the colony I or Loudon, and he was prepared to pay £10 if what he (Mr Holmes) stated was not correct. (Applauae.) He was not a ' candidate, and did not want their votes; he only wanted their intelligence. (Ap- I plause, and'a Voice—"Show us the ether aide.") He would do that. (A Voice— * What did you come for if you don't, j want our votes t") He came there to ex- j plain to the farmers the false ideas that i were being put before them by some people i who had no right to go there. (Applause.) j He had a right because he was an elector of the district, an employer of labour in j le, and a farmer In it. (Applause.) The j fact was he was hitting them bard, aud j they knew it. But he would tell them that when a Britisher was hard hit i he took it quietly. (Applause.) He would go a little further and say that the present system of taxation was all in ! i favour of the towns and all against the I country. (Applause and dissent.) If a ! man in the town bought a piece of land ' valued at £500, and put improvements, say a hotel, on it to the value of £5000, which yielded him, say, £550 a year, and he earned elsewhere £250 a year, which made £SUO of an income, he paid not a shilling of taxation. (Applause.) If the man had invested his money in land, he would have been taxed on its bare value, about £24 a year. (A Voice—"No, no.") He told them it was true. (Applause and "No, no.") They were deceived and deluded by humbugs. (Applause and dissent.) The man knew it who was talking to them—(Loud applause)—and when he hit them hard tbey cried like babies. (Loud applause and a Voice—" You're no Liberal.") Was that class of taxation in accordance with the principles for equality of sacrifice ? Was ie equality of sacrifice for a man who mads £700 or £800 a year to pay nothing at all, while the farmer who made £200 a year off his land was fully taxed, after labouring from daylight until dark to obtain it: That was what was called equality of sacrifice and legislating for the masses and the farmers. (Applause and dissect.) Should he give them another illustration f Take, for instance, the case of a widow, whose husband had left her £4000, which was -nvested in mortgage, and yielded an income of £240 a year. Was it carrying out the noble principles of Liberalism that such a woman should be taxed ? (Applause I and interruption.) Was there any but a lop-sided Socialist who would say that she should be. But what did they find that this Government was doing, the Govern-

ment which was in favour of the poor widow, of. the masses, of equality of sacrifice. They found it making the poor widow pay £ld 13 i 4d as a tax out of her £240 a year, or they demanded from her what was almost equivalent to a rent. (Interruption.) And let them not forget that the Government knew all-about it, because he had drafted petitions to it two years »go. and had pointed out the injustice. (Applause.) The man wno would support such an infamous misapplication of the system of taxation deserved nothing better than hanging at the nearest lamp-post. (Ohsl and applause.) He would stick to the land and income tax ns lon gas he had breath in his bady, and if they only put meu In who knew what they were doing, such as Sir Robert Stout and others, they would have this gross* irregularity, inconsistency, and oppression removed. (Applause.) (A Voice—" What do you rec-on you are?") He reckoned he was what everyone knew him to be—a man. (Applause.) An honest man; and he hoped he could say the same of the man who had interrupted. (Applause and laughter.) He didn't mind a little disturbance, because it showed that it hit them hard. (Renewed applause.) On that taxation question Mr Reeves in hit speech of Friday had said what was absolutely incorrect, and if they looked in Monday's papers they 3ould see that gentleman challenged. If he took it up then they would be able to see proved who was ri_ht; if he did not take it up they would see then that he (Mr Holmes) was correct. (Loud applause and a Voica—"Do you want to disqualify | Mr Reeves by getting him to bet?") This was no bet, it was a challenge. (Interruption.) He feared he was not speaking to many farmers. (A Voice—" We know too much for you " aud laughter.) If there were he wanted to speak to them on the next question on which the policy of the Liberals was founded, and that was the LAND QUESTION. The Liberal policy was to encourage settlement and give the security of tenure. Hs supposed all knew what the security of tenure meant, and those who came from Ireland would know what insecurity meant. (Laughter and applause). Any man who had a regard for his land would nurture it as he would his own child, and the application of a system which did not encourage him to do it was bad. What security was there when, after a landlord had leased a man the property for twenty-nine or thirty years, he came down on him in twelve or thirteen years, and said he wanted ie at his own price, and when it was refused to him, he turned out the tenant? Would they think that was fair, or just, or honest? (Voices—"No, no 1" A Voice—" Nobody wants to do it.") Now he had pinned them to something, and went on to explain that under the Laud for Settlement Bill, a farm he had purchased, with a title to himself and his heirs, could be taken by the Government had the Bill become law, and he could obtaiu no redress uatil he went to the Court after he had been evicted. (A Voice—" The land's for the people.") Yes, the people throuarh their representatives bad sold the laud or leased' it, and after doing that they said they did not care a dump, aud practically gave the Government power to rob the owner of it. Unless the transaction were voluntarily entered into, it wa* dishonest to take it by compulsion. (Applause.) It was the worst form of eviction, and would absolutely destro3' the whole system of freehold tenure. (Loud applause.) He had a little authority for what he said, and it was called the Lands for Settlement Bill, and if it had become law the freehold tenure would have been gone; they would have had no more security of tenure than an Irish tenant at will. The Bill went to the Lands Committee, who decided the quantity of first class, second class, and third class land that should not be touched. But if it were carried ie would practically mean the man of 10JO acres could be broken up. Then the principle would be extended to 500 ncrea. 300 acres, 200 acres, 100 acres —('"No, uo" aud interruption)— and so on until the freehold was gone. (" No, no.") They would become mere slaves to the Government. (Repeated "No, no*," and a Voice—"Who would they give it to?") All to the loafers who supported them. (Laughter and applause, and Mr O'Brien —" You are doing wrong to the best Government in the world ; not one of the best, but the best." Interruption, during which several people left the hall.) He would continue that under the compulsory taking of land the security of freehold tenure was destroyed, until iti time the people would be brought; to the level of the Chinese, who were considered passing rich on a, half-acre section, j (Laughter and applause.) But he would tell them what should be the policy, ana that was the voluntary buying of laud. He was in favour of that, aud had advocated it years ago. Under that scheme the Government could get thousands of acres to settle. His friend Mr Thomas could no doubt supply them. (Mr Thomas—"The Government say its too dear.") Yes, the Government wanted to get it at less than its value. (MrTHOMAS—"And I don't know if you are far wrong." Laughter.) He knew that many offers of land in Canterbury had been made to the Government and refused, and the Hon. Mr McKenzie's statement that no land could be got was opposed to fact. (A Voice—"Where is the land ?") Some had been offered near Ambeiiey, some near Christchurch, at Tai Tapu—(A Voice—" That ought to be good enough ") —and some about Methven, and there was nob a single acre that was not worth at the rate of £4 or £5. Then Mr Deans had offered them land, and so had Mr Gray. But the Government's £50,000 was not enough to purchase. The amount should have been at least £100.000, and then with able agents such as Mr Thomas — (Mr Thomas—"l can't sell them anything)— the land could be found for them. (Hear, hear.) Under that voluntary system injustice would be done to none. Under the present proposals the Government wanted to make the people mad; to drive them to extremities, and to go in for such a system meant open and daylight robbery. (Applause.) The voluntary policy he had sketched out .should be the policy of Liberals. It was the policy of such moderate Liberals as Mr Wason and Mr Purnell. (" Oh's " and applause.) lt was the policy of every honest Liberal —(applause)—and if he were to speak for half an hour on the subject with Mr Seddon, that gentleman would adopt his views to a hair. (Laughter and applause). THE SECOND EVICTION BILL. This brought him to the Roads Validation Bill, which was the Second Eviction Bill and which was aimed at the country, but as the legal interpretation of road was street as well as road, it applied with equal force to the towns. Under it the Government could have taken a quarter of a chain on each side of narrow roads and psid no compensation to the owners for the loss of their fences, flower beds and lawns. It might be all very well to trust in a Government that destroyed the security of the land tenure, destroyed the freehold, endeavoured to nationalise the land and make everybody tenants of the State, but those who allowed them to do that would soon be in the position of the Russians, who he questioned if they, envied. (Applause.) THE LABOUR BILL. There was another little Bill, the Labour Bill, and this affected the ladies perhaps more than anyone else. It permitted Mr W. P. Beeves to interfere between the farmer and his man or Mrs Farmer and her servant. If there were a dispute Mr Reeves could, after certain preliminaries, order an enquiry, calling witnesses from distances uoc more than 200 miles for examination. He could ask Mrs Farmer to give him certain information within a month and if she refused the proposal was that she Could be fined not less than £20 and not more tbau £100 or sent to gaol for three months. (Applause and laughter). Was this, he asked, a Government for the people or for the masses, and did it carry out the principles of equality and justice. Be thought not. (Applause). The meeting closed with a vote of thanks to the Chairman. in explanation. Mr J. Holmes resumed bis address at 8 o'clock in the evening, when there was | another large attendance. Mr R. Bird I (the Mayor) presided. Mr Hor.ME3, who was again well received, said he wished it to be understood that he advocated the claims of no particular candidate (applause), though it had been rumoured about that he did. It was true he was supporting Mr Wason, and it was untrue that he came there for the purpose of asking any candidate to retire. (Applause). A DEMOCRACY. Resuming his subject, he proceeded that the extension of the franchise eg the women required that they who had no experience iv political matters should have opportunities to hear both sides of the question. (Applause). They would have heard that other side on the previous night, only that he had given up the hall to Mr Seddon to suit that gentleman's convenience and at his request. (Applause). To the women he would say that the exercise of the vote involved the serious duty of choosing men to represent them who were able and willing and disposed to make laws for the benefit

of all the people of the country. (Applause.) Nothing was more detestable than Liberalism or legislation of a class character. If we wanted to make this a Democracy even better than America, men mr t be returned whose sympathies were with every class, and who would not encourage ill-feeling between or amongst any class. Parties should be run upon lines of what are called honest Liberalism—fair play to all. liberty to all, justice fairly administered, and equality before the laws. The. one thing which marred it was PARTY GOVERNMENT, which we had unfortunately imported from the Old Country. This class of Government as carried out here was injurious to the country and shonld be amended. The Premier and the Ministry should be elected by the House, as the members were elected by the people. At present the majerity had all the say and the minority was disregarded. This was utterly opposed to the principles of true Liberalism. The proposal introduced some years ago by Major Steward, and a similar one submitted by Sir Robert Stout at Wellington and Christchurch, seemed to him to be reasonable. The manner in which Bills were dealt with now was absurd, and he illustrated his objection to the system of Party Government as at present carried out, and until it was amended there would never be fair and just Government. (Applause.) The Conservative party of Sir John Hall and Major Atkinson, gave us the one man one vote, and it was practically the Conservative party—Sir John Hall was a Conservative, so-called — wbicb gave the women the franchise. The establishment of the one man one vote killed Conservatism, and any man who voted for that principle was a Democrat. We thus got rid of the term Conservative and now we had moderate and extreme Liberals. The question now was, whether the. policy of one side was more in the interests of the country than the policy of the other. Extremes were bad, and moderation was always the safest, and it was to be decided whether the opinions of those who took an extreme view, like the policy of the present Government, should be pushed, or whether the opinions of those who held the moderate views should be adopted. CLOSE SETTLEMENT. It was recoguised by every politician that it was to the benefit of the colony that there should be closer settlement, which was a different thing from the settlement of the unsettled lands. The proposal for closer settlement was that the Government should from time to time buy certain lands and distribute them among people who desired to settle on them on easy terms. Such terms were introduced by Mr Rolleston in 1882, land by the perpetual lease or lease with right to purchase, and they were practically the terms of the present Government, the extreme party of which had added the lease in perpetuity. It was here that came the split between the moderate and the extreme Liberals, and the people had to decide whether the land should be leased for 999 years, or secured by freehold tenure. (The speaker was here interrupted by some persons leaving the Hall.) He observed that those who did not want to hear him could-retire, as he did not wish any to remain that preferred to go. (Appluus,e.) .The moderate Liberals he held—those to whom he belonged—were as anxious as the extremists to settle the people on the land, but they desired the security of tenure, as only under it could we get settlers of the first class, who would work t he laud properly. (Applause.) Then there was a difference on the matter of small farmers. The extremists wanted nothing but. small farms. The moderates wanted f>tiiaU /arms, medium sized, and large ones, because the one helped the other. Mr J. Grigg's district was an illustration in point. There a large farm found employment for owners of smaller farms. The smaller farmer produced the labour—that was the children—and the larger farmer the capital with which to employ that labour. If all the farms were cut up into small ones, it simply meant that many of the children of the small farmers would have to seek employment in the towns, and there compete with other labourers, with the result that wages would at once go down, a result which was shown in Canada. The large farmer employed the sons of the small farmer all the year round at from £60 to £70 a year, and a young man who went to the plough at sixteen or eighteen years of age, and was thrifty and persevering, could by the,time he was twenty-five years of age be well enough off to go in for a piece of land, and'eVentually •make'lffhis own if the tenure were secured. If there were no larg«g farmers, the small ones, with their sons and their horses, would find themselves idle in the winter time at the least. To carry out the. extremists' proposals meant injury of the. small farmers, their children, increase of the labouring population of the towns, and reduce wages to starvation point. (Applause). LABOUR AND CAPITAL. This brought him to the question of labour and capital, both of which had to be encouraged, for the one was useless without the other. Every man who was saving money to employ labour should be embraced as the best, and warmest friend, for labour- was worthless without capital to employ it, and he did not think it would require any argument to convince his audience that the more capital was brought here with which to employ labour the more there was for the labourer. The more that was done to drive it away the more injury was done to the people aud the colony; the more the security of capital was injured the more were the people injured. The bursting up cry prevetited people spending on land. Money was kept in the Banks and that was the working man's loss. Mr Seddon had told them that since the advent of his Government people had been flocking back again to this colony. He did not tell them that the people had come here because the capital in Victoria had been spent; that there was an end to the boom and people came here to look for employment and increased tho demaud for labour to the injury of the labourers of New Zealand. .This brought him to another question. General Booth came here when Mr Ballance was alive and wanted to introduce some of his people here. The moderate Liberals said there was population enough for the capital we had to employ, and objection was made to General Booth's scheme. He (Mr Holmes) wrote le.tters in opposition to it, and pressure was brought to bear on Mr Ballance until the proposal to give 5000 acres to General Booth Was abandoned. He did not think the colony had suffered any loss thereby. (Applause.) A government's capital. This carried him to the question of a Government's capital which was raised by means of taxation. What - had been borrowed had been spent, and to pay ordinary expenses money had to be raised. When the Vogel Government went out of office there was a little deficit of £400,000. In 1884 Mr Macandrew and himself (the speaker) urged retrenchment, but the Government refused, went to the country and got defeated. The Atkinson Government came into power and adopted a selfreliant policy, decided to spend within their income, and from that day the tide of prosperity to the colony turned. English capitalists seeing we were honest lent money, which was taken up by the people, who improved their lands, employed labour, and all went well. Then the meat industry increased our income and the wool export very largely increased, and it was in his opinion due to the brave action of that noble soldier. Sir Harry Atkinson, that the colony took so prosperous a turn. The Government which succeeded him up to a short time ago went on carrying out that self-rHiant policy, but Mr Ballance before he died proposed a policy which Mr Seddon is carrying on, and which, if insisted iv, would bring this colony to the brink of ruin. (A Voice—" No, no.") He told them it was so, and it could not be gainsaid. The Liberal policy recognised that when men were out of work and could not find employment it was the duty of the Government to find employment for those able and willing, at wages that would not compete with private employers of labour. He objected to poor rates of pay, and "*vith tbe aid of Messrs White and Hulbert, who was Mayor of Christchurch, the men's wages were made 4s 6d per day instead of 3s 6d. But the men were not sent to Catlin's river, the North Cape, or the wilds of Otago. Married men had work found for them near Christchurch; 262 were relieved, and out of that number only one was a farm labourer, twenty-five to thirty were lamp-post men," and the remainder were bona fide labourers. The result was that the depression was tided over; and he knew of one man who had now gradually got on until he had managed to get settled on 200 acres at Patea. That was the way to make a nation of the people. (Applause.) It was, however, not possible for the Government to employ all people who would work at Government stroke out of the revenue of the country, and the Government had had to borrow for that, and at a very great cost to the country. Mr Seddon had admitted that the Government had to borrow the money, and that he (the speaker) held arose from the fact that they were going beyond what

was the principle of the Liberal party, that of finding work only for the necessitous cases. When they went beyond that, they vtolated liberalism. This was a point on which the moderates and extremists differed. It that were continued, ie would be found that it was carried out for some party and unprincipled purpose. (Applause.) other reforms. He came now to another social reform, which was the Conciliation Bill to settle atrike«, which were practically things unknown in farming districts, where he believed wages had remained at about the same rate for the past twenty-five years, while the necessaries of the farm labourer had cheapened. The moderate Liberals said if there were disputes between employer and employed they should be settled by a Board of Conciliation. The extreme party wanted more. They wanted compulsion. They wanted to oe able to say to a man that he should pay so much wage per man for two years or be fined £500. This kind of thing would only recoil on the employees, as the employer would rather sell one than be harassed by such legislation. (Hear, hear.) Compulsion was bad if conciliation did all that was required to ba done 1 (Hear, hear,) On the policy connected with the railways there was practically little difference between tha two parties. The moderates wanted two Commissioners on the Board aud a Minister as chairman with only a deliberative vote. It had been acknowledged that under the Commissioners the nil ways paid better, the freights were less, and passenger rates were less and their accommodation better. If the Premier were allowed both a casting and deliberative vote, if anything went wrong the Commissioners would get all the blame; If there was anything good done he would get all the praise and the Commissioners none. That was not a fair position to place the Commissioners in, and any reasonable man should accept the terms proposed by the moderates. (Applause.) In the matter of land settlement the moderates said if the land were bought for settlement it should not be sold for cash. What was the use in buying Cheviot, if it were to be Bold for cash. It would only mean that Government would eventually have to buy it again, and that would not be a profitable process to the colony. While objecting to the principle that destroyed the security of tenure, the moderates would have the land applied to the purpose for which it was purchased. (Hear, hear.) In conclusion he would say that the people should be instilled with that glorious love for their country which was found wherever people were found who owned their own little plots of land ; they should be instilled with a spirit of patriotism, that they might be able to say, in the words of Scott :—

" Lives there a man with soul so dead, Who never to himself has said, This is mine own my native land." —(Loud applause); On the motion of Mr J. Orr, seconded by Mr Rickman, Mr Holmes was accorded a hearty vote of thanks for his address.

The usual compliment to the Chairman closed the meeting.