Mr, Bryce at Waverley.

Evening Post, Volume XXIX, Issue 109, 1 June 1885, Page 2

Mr, Bryce at Waverley.

[Bt Tklioeaph.] lunitkd fbißß association. | Patxa, 31st May. Mr. Bryoe addressed a well-attended meeting of his constituents lost night at Waverley. He said he last addressed them as a Minister of the Crown, but now as a member of her Majesty's Opposition. He then, at considerable length, reviewed the oiroumstanoes attending the retirement of the late Government and the accession of the present Ministry to offioe. They threatened all sorts of terrible disclosures as to the acts of their predecessors, but they all turned out moont shine. He strongly oondemned the action of Ministers in bringing in a number of policy Bills and making one dependent on the other. The result was that if you were interested in one, you must vote for the lot, or imperil the one in whioh you were interested. Suoh a huge pieoe of log-rolling was never known in the colony before, and that was saying a great deal. He,was greatly opposed to the District Railways Bill, and objeoted to trust the Government in the matter, as Sir J. Vogel was chairman of one oompany and Mr. Stout solicitor to another. He also condemned giving a million and a half aores to the East and West Coast railway syndicate, and said that the whole arrangement was opposed to the interests of the colony. The finanoial polioy of tho Government was unequivocally oondemned and pronounced a complete failure. The proposals sketched by the Treasurer in regard to local government differed very little from the present system, and would not meot publio requirements. He did not think Ministers were themselves agreed on the matter. It was said that power was to be given to Native Committees to deal with titles to land. It was the merest folly to deal with native land before the title waa determined. It was a most grievous wrong to the oolony to go on with the Central Railway route with no prospect of definite settlement, thus largely increasing the value of land for the native owners, who were not liable to taxation. He was a North Island man, but said most emphatioally that not a sod onght to have been turned till satisfactory titles to the land through which the line passed had been obtained. To the present irritation on the East Coast he did not attach muoh importance, if the natives were firmly dealt with. He would simply enforce the law with them as with Europeans. If this were firmly and fairly done no harm would come. No amount of palaver could take the place of enforcing the law. He was sorry he oould not take so hopeful a view" as Major Atkinson did of the position of the oolony. He observed a greater tendency in the men of to-day to fly finanoial kites than to dig colonial potatoes. Unless that disposition took a turn for the better, he oould not help feeling that the oolony was in a serious position. If prosperity was to be secured, a different plan wonld have to be adopted than that being pursued by the present Government. It had lived, politically, on exoiting expectations whioh could not be realised, and it wonld die, politically, of the disappointed hopes it had created. A vote of confidence was carried unanimously.