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Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 5913, 19 August 1890, Page 2

If Sir Harry Atkinson had been able to take his place in the House this session we should have heard nothing about any compact between the Government and the Opposition as to thefurther conduct of public business. The Premier would have wanted to know whether the Government or the Opposition were in charge, and with his "hob-nail boots" ho would nave crushed the obstructionists. His absence, however, makes all the difference ; and, perhaps, the compact was the best that Ministers could make, as they were not disposed to fiirht. It is a discreditable compact from which ever side it is looked at, reflecting no little disgrace on both parties of the Houee. The true reason for it is that neither the Government nor the Opposition can find a leader. There is consequently no discipline, and party government has become impossible. A New Zealand Parliament has never before presented such a miserable spectacle as that of the Government haggling for concessions from a weak Opposition. What. it all comes to is that this compact is nothing more nor less than a Parliamentary strike. The members have struck against the performance of their duties for the purpose of pocketing the honorarium before they have earned it. Nothing would have pleased these gentry more than to have received their £150 a piece, and for Parliament to have been dissolved within a week of it being opened. They thought that this was to have been the programme, and they are beside themselves with disappointment because they were asked to do some work.