BUDGET AND REFORM.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 771, 21 March 1910, Page 7

BUDGET AND REFORM.

SPEECH BY MR. ASQUITH. HIS SECOND CHAMBER SCHEME. v. .• ABSOLUTE VETO MUST GO. By Telegraph—Press Association—OopyrlEhl (Rec. March 20, 5 p.m.) London, March 19. Mr. Asquith, in a speech at Oxford, said the election had created a position unforeseen by ail parties. It was only after hesitation ithat he and . his _ colleagues concluded th.it it was their duty to remain in. office. The Budget must be pressed forward with promptitude and dispatch, in order to set right the unexampled financial confusion produced by the action of the House of Lords. A rationally constituted Second Chamber was desirable, not a Chamber overwhelmingly and undisguisably partisan. The reform debate in the House of Lords showed a desire that that ancient structure should be disguised with a coat of democratic whitewash. The Liberals would demand that - the Second Chamber should be rebuilt on a democratic basis, thus preventing a chronic deadlock in legislative power. The country had declared itself predominantly Liberal. The absolute veto must go.

A SHAM AND A SGREEN. "TIMES'S" COMMENT. THE GOVERNMENT'S PROPOSALS. (Rec. March 20, 5 p.m.) London, March 19. "The, Times," commenting on the above speech, states: —"Mr. Asquith and his friends mean to preserve the Second Chamber as a shanf and a screen.. That is a new democratic conception of English constitutional (government." "The Times" also states that the germ of "the Government's proposals for the reform of the House of Lords will be found in Clause 63 of the South Africa Act. .

THE IDEA OF A SINGLE CHAMBER. MB. CHURCHILL NOT FRIGHT--ENED. (Rec. March 21, 1.5 a.m.) London, March 20. :Mr. Winston Churchill,; speaking at Manchester, said: "I am not frightened by the idea of a Single Chamber. I do not attach the importance to the question which some 'Jo. If a Second Chamber is established in the future it must be based on the votes of the great' masses of the wage-earning population. The' Government's resolutions will be ,tabled 'on Tuesday. 'They are - Sir Henry pampbell-Bannerman's, strengthened by Mr. Asquith in one or two particulars. The debate on the resolutions will commence on March 29. The Budget has been misrepresented and misunderstood in Ireland, but the House of Lords must be jnade ,to swallow both the veto and .the Budget proposals. , I doi not -..believe that Parliament will come toj an untimely end through* the Budget failing."

LORD LANSDOWNE'S POLICY. REDUCTION IN NUMBERS. \ London, March 18. The - ' "Standard" summarises Lord Lansdowne'B Second Chamber policy as under:— ' . . The veto powers not to bo w.eakened. The number of peers to be reduced, . but the whole of tho peerage to '.. select representatives of their own body. : - r. ' Other peers to sit without election, ', by virtue of public services. .The Government ,of the day to also select a number, of peers with a tenure long enough to be uninfluenced by general elections! The; principle of life peerages to be extended so as to cover representation' of all : the sohools ■ of political: thought and great in- . terests of the country. SIR H. CAMPBELL BANNERMAN'S PLAN. - Sir Henry Campbell Bannerman's proposals referred-to in Mr. Churchill's speech, were introduced in the House of Commons on June 26, 1907, in the form of the following resolution :— -i ' That in order to give effect to the will of the people, as , expressed by , their elected representatives, it is neoessary that the : power of the, other House to alter or reject Bills should, be so > restrained by law as -to secure that within the limits of a single Parliament the i final decision of the Commons shall prevail. It was pointed out at the : time'that this was to deprive the House 1 -' of Lords of the power of preventing rash legislation by a chance majority. The resolution, which' was merely an abstract

one, and which bound no one, was carried. . The plan of -the Ministry was understood to be as follows, though it was never embodied in a Bill: —•

If a measure was sent up from the Commons to the Lords and was rejected by the Lords, then a conference would follow between members appointed in equal number the two Houses. If the conference aid not result in agreement, the Bill might again be reintroduced in the Commons after six months. It would then be sent up again. If it were once more rejected there would be a conference as before. If the seoond attempt failed ' the ■ Bill wasj after the lapse of ■ six months, to be reintroduced a third time in the Commons, passed, and sent up again. Once more, if the Lords and Commons differed there was to bo a conference, and, if this failed, the Bill was to become law without the Lords' assent. '

JOINT SITTINCS. The clause in the South Africa Act referred to in the above cablegrams reads as follows!— ' If the Legislative Assembly passes any Bill and the Senate rejects or fails to pass it, or passes it with amendments, to which the Legislative Assembly will not agreo, and upon which tho Senate insists s the Governor-General may convene a joint sitting of tho members of the Senate and Legislative AsThe members present at any such joint sitting may' deliberate and sh'all vote together upon the Bill, as last proposed by the Legislative Assembly, ana upon amendments, if any, which have been made therein by the one House of • Parliament, and not agreed to by the other, and any such amendments .whioh are affirmed by a majority of tho total number of members of the Senate and Legislative Assembly present at such sitting shall bo taken to <have been carried, and if tho Bill with the amendments, if' any, is affirmed by a majority of the menibjrs of the Senato and Legislative Assembly present at, such sitting it shall be taken to have 1 been duly passed by Parliament. THE SOUTH AFRICAN PARLIAMENT. Colonel Seely, in the course of his speech in the House of Commons on the South Africa'Bill, said: — ' The Parliament is to bo composed of the King, the Senate, and the Houao

of Assembly. The Senate has 40 representatives, of whom eight are nominated by the Governor-General-in-Coun-eil, and eight arc elected for each province. It will thus be seen that there are 32 added to eight nominated members. Of the eight Senators who are to bo nominated, four are to be chosen for special knowledge and acquaintance with native affairs and the reasonable wantß and wishes of the coloured races; and I think this is a good provision, which may very likely be extended as timo goes on. At anyrate, in the Senate there is the' special representation in some form of the native races. I should say that the Senate, as a Second Chamber, has the right to reject or to amend all Bills except money Bills—(laughter and cheers) —and the latter it may not amend, but it may reject. Arrangements are made, following the precedents of the Transvaal and the Orange River Colony, and also derived, I think, from a similar precedent in Australia, by which the two Houses sit and vote together. In the case of money Bills they do so at once; in the case of other Bills it is only after a measure has been passed a second time by the House of Assembly. As the House of Assembly numbers 121, and the Senate only 40, it would appear that its power is . somewhat greater than in the case of some Assemblies nearer home.