POLITICAL NEWS AND NOTES

Evening Post, Volume LVI, Issue 73, 23 September 1898, Page 5

POLITICAL NEWS AND NOTES

THE POLICE COMMISSION'S DEPORT. Mr. Bollard was yegterda\ r assured by the Premier that it would be unnecessary to give the House a further opportunity of discussing the report of the Police Commission. The Commissioner was now going through the Report, and he would advise the Minisler of Defence on the matter, after which Cabinet would consider Mr. Tunbridge's recommendations, and a statement would be made to the House. The responsibility must rest with tlie Government. (Hear, bear.) In respect to the financial phase, he (Mr. Seddon) would have liked to have the advice of the Public Accounts Committee, and if time were at the disposal of the Committee the question might be remitted to it without a resolution of the House. NEW ZEALAND AND THE STOCK EXCHANGE. In the House yesterday afternoon Mr. Duthie asked the Colouial Treasurer:— 1. What were the reasons assigned which in July last influenced the Committee of the London Stock Exchange to refuse a quotation for the £2,700,000 3 per cent. New Zealand debentures then proposed to be floated, and which necessitated a withdrawal of the application? 2. What steps have been taken to redeem the various bonds, amounting to £2,166,566, which fell due in May last? 3. Has the Treasurer's notice been drawn to the adverse criticism by certain London journals of the above application ; and will he take such steps as are necessary to ayoid again placing the colony in such a position ? In putting his question the member for Wellington quoted certain paragraphs in the Investors' .Review that criticised severely the action of the Government in respect of the matters referred to. The Premier, in reply, expressed regret that questions should be based on adverse criticism of the kind quoted by Mr. Duthie without careful enquiries being first made as to their correctness. The writer of the article in question, Mr. Wilson, was a determined enemy of the colony, and bad repeatedly written it down. The £2,700,000 was never placed, and consequently never withdrawn. It was never asked to be placed, and the whole story \vas without foundation. The Bank of England in the ordinary way applied for quotations ; the Stock Exchange never refused the quotation, but asked for information about the 3 per cent, inscribed stock. The information was given, and \a few days ago he (the Premier) learned that a considerable sum had been converted in the 3 per cents, at £99 6s Bd. As soon as he saw the article he communicated with the Agent-General, and was told in reply that the Committee of the Stock Exchange had not refused the quotation. The Government was not floating a loan of £2,700,000, but merely carrying out a conversion. He had no idea why the affair had been mentioned. They had met every call, aud would continue to do so as necessity arose. The operation had been carried out satisfactorily all along. THE BEUNNER MINE FUND. Attention was called by Mr. Guinness yesterday to the smallness of the weekly contribution paid to the widows who lost their husbands in the Brunner coal-mine accident, and to the children of the deceased miners. The member for the Grey pointed out that if the weekly contribution was limited, as at present, to 12s for widows and 4s for children until they reached the age of 16, a large sum of money was likely to remain unused in the hands of the Public Trustee. The Premier said, in reply, that not long ago litigation took place and a large number of widows succeeded in obtaining from the company a large sum of money. After having obtained that large sum of mone}', to now ask him to assist them in getting an increased weekly payment out of the Brunner fund seemed to him to be somewhat unreasonable. He took the opportunity of saying that had the people of the colony known that action was to be taken by the widows the effect of which was to close the mine for some weeks and entail hardships on the miners, he questioned very much whether so large a sum would have been subscribed by the benevolently disposed. While at Greymouth he had been interviewed with respect to the fund, and complaint had been made that some of the widows who had re-married had only been allowed £5 by the Trustee. He had suggested that this amount might be increased to £50. (Mr. Pirani — " As a dowry," and laughter.) As fresh actuarial calculation would have to be made before the conditions of the trust could be departed from, OUE STIPENDIARY MAGISTBATE. Mr. Pirani yesterday asked the Minister of Justice whether his attention had been directed to a statement alleged to have been made by Mr. Kerfny, S.M., in the Wellington Court, on the 9th June, to the effect that although a defendant had given evidence in another Court in proper form in a case, he intended to treat such cases as undefended, unless defendant attended the Wellington Court or was represented by counsel ; and if he thought such a method of dealing with defended cases was just and proper. The member for Palmerston quoted from the report of the case appearing iv the Evening Post, which he said had been described by a member as " the most independent paper in Christendom." It was surely an anomaly to say that evidence given in another Court was to be ignored, and the case treated as undefended unless the defendant was represented personally in the Wellington Court or by counsel. The Minister of Justice replied that his attention had been drawn to the matter, and having been furnished with a report he found that the practice was one relating to the Court. The Government would not be justified in interfering in the administration of justice. Mr. Pirani — I would like to point out to the Minister that this is not a case o£ justice, but a case of injustice. DISXHIDUTION QF THE 'FEISCO MAILS. Mr. Duthie is evidently determined to fight to the bitter end the question of the delay occasioned in the delivery of the 'Frisco mail throughout the colony, o\viug to proper despatch not being used in connection with the mail after its arrival at Auckland. He raised the question again in the House yesterday, pointing out the delays which had occurred in connection with the last two mails, and urging that mails which arrived at Auckland, on the Tuesday should be here on Wednesday. He went into the matter at some length, pointing out the serious inconvenience that the delay caused to business men. * The Premier admitted that the question of better communication between Wellington and "Auckland should receive early consideration, and he suggested that the matter might be referred to a Select Committee, to enquire into the best means of establishing this communication. He explained the causes of the delay in the delivery of the last mail, aud stated that the whole question of the ocean mail services would come up for consideration later in the session, when the matter could be fully discussed. YICTOEIA COLLEGE AND THE MOUNT COOK BESEEVE. The question of endowing the Victoria University College with a portion of the Mount "Cook Reserve and vesting the balance of the reserve in the City Corporation was mentioned, in the House yesterday by Mr. Duthie, who .asked the Government if this would be done. The Premier, who replied, waxed sarcastic on the moderateness of the request. Mr. Duthie was, he said, only asking the Government to hand over about £100,000 to the Municipality. The Government had sent a communication to the University College Council stating that there was a piece of land something like two acres in extent situated in Buckle-street, which they might have as an endowment. At the present time the barracks were upon it, This land was worth some £15,000

or £20,000. In asking Parliament to give the College this endowment he was making very liberal provision for it. In order to help the Council to start working classes at the College the Government proposed to allow it the use of the Ministerial residence in Tinakori-road. Parliament/ had committed the colony to the estahishmeut of this University College, and the Government would probably have to ask Parliament to vote a sum for the College building as well as giving the land. THE POINT HALSWELL BOAD. An agitation was started some months ago in the columns of this journal with the objeoO of having the road along the sea frontage round Point Halswell thrown open to tlio public, Yesterday Mr. Wilson raised lh« question in the House, and asked that tue gates put up by the Defence Department pi.»venting the public from using the road should be removed. He ridiculed the idea that it would give any additional opportunity for getting information concerning the harbour defences. The Minister of Defence pointed out that there was really no road at Ihe place stated, but only a track. The question of opening the road had been considered, and tue_ Government had been advised b} r the Commander of the Forces that it should not be opened until alterations now going on were completed. Mr. Wilson asked if these alterations would be completed before the summer, and the answer was in the negative, whereat the member for the Suburbs niuttered his dissatisfaction. A CUSTOMS COMPLAINT. Complaint was made yesterday by Mr. Duthie of a system of fining which has sprung up in the Customs Department. The member for this city asked the Commissioner for Customs whether he was aware that the Department takes upon itself the power to fine importers who have passed a wrong entry (usually quite innocently), and if he would in accordance indicate under which clause of the Act this power >vas exercised. The- Premier said power was given to impose fines by section 54 of the Customs Law Consolidation Act, 1882. MB. LAWBY AND ME. NOBTHCEOFT. Mr. John Burns writes to the Auckland Star to repudiate Mr. Lawry's implication that he was one of the persons who asked him (Mr. Lawry) to help to have Mr. Northcroft retained in Auckland. "I have for years," he says, " only spoken to Mr. Lawry on very rare occasions, a passing word when I have happened to meet him on the street. . . . The one item of truth in Mr. Lawry's statement is that he did write in m-y office, two months after Mr. Northcroft's departure, the telegram to which he refers, but even this statement is vitiated by suggestio falsi. It suggests that I had asked him to write such a telegram, and that he came tp my office to write it at my request. Both of these suggestions are false, and indeed the whole statement is untrue in so far as it contains an}' suggestion of intimacy on my part with Mr. Lawry P JOTTINGS. " The Minister in charge of the Bill does not himself understand it," was Mr. Massey's opinion of the Premier last evening on the Old Age Pensions Bill. The opinion was heartily endorsed in various quarters. Bouquets are still the order of the day in the House. Messrs. Allen and Lethbridge were last evening the recipients of dainty bunches of daffodils, with the customary accompanying notes. •The member for Palmerston yesterday succeeded in getting the Minister of Justice to place on record Mr. Northcroft's denial of the statement made in the House recently by Mr. Lawry, and about which much has been said lately. Mr. Scobie Mackenzie told the House last evening that although it had been repeatedly said that the Old Age Pensions Bill was a charitable aid scheme, no one in the House had attempted to deny that theory.

A gentleman in Now York received a visit from a, farmer friend, and, being anxious to show him all the latest things, proposed to take him to hear the phonograph. "The phonograph," said the man from thooountry^ ; "' what's that?" " Weli. the phonograph is a talking machine," said the city man. "I guess I don't want to see no talking machine,' ' said the farmer ; " I've got one of them home, and I'm blamed if I cankeep her qviiet." The Yerex <fc Jones Company, Victoria-otreet, are head-quarters for the graphophoiie — the perfected talkiug.maobine.— -Adv-t.