Evening Post. MONDAY, JUNE 14, 1909. ADDRESS-IN-REPLY DEBATE.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVII, Issue 139, 14 June 1909, Page 6

Evening Post. MONDAY, JUNE 14, 1909. ADDRESS-IN-REPLY DEBATE.

An interesting feature of the debate on the Address-in-Reply was Mr. Luke's declaration of independence. As a candidate at the general election, Mr. Luke often spoke in a similar strain, facing left free to do so by the fact that Wellington Suburbs was one of the few constituencies in which the Government found the choice of a candidate- so difficult that they gave it up altogether. But in Wellington Suburbs, which, was a new electorate, and therefore had nositting member, the difficulty of the Government was not that there was no suitable candidate available, but that there were two. The Government supporters in the constituency were pretty closely divided between Mr. Luke andi'j Mr. Fitzgerald, and both men proved'^ themselves so strong, and so closely in». accord with the policy of the Government, that it was not deemed advisable to make any official declaration for or against either of them. When Mr. Luke had secured the seat, it was as easy a job for the Government to back the winner as it would have been if his rival bad succeeded instead. But Mr. Luke surprised a good many o& his friends on Saturday by a speech which showed not only that he can talk as independently now as during his election campaign, but that he can effect the much nearer transition from ia-depend-ent talk to independent action. He declared himself as ready to give, the Government a general support, and as in entire accord with their offer ofi. a Dreadnought. But with regard to the proposed prorogation, be contended that "it was time we had an end of this one-man Ministry," and that the Premier was "putting the question of party before the true interests of the Dominion." The proposal to postpone the business of Parliament for more them, three months appeared to him "the biggest blundei that the Government had ever made," and he declined to be. a party to it. The division list shows that Mr. Luke was true to his word., Wo heartily congratulate Mr. Luke upon the courage w33i which, as a new member, he has asserted his independence on a question of the first importance at the very outset, and we trust that the performance of his Parliamentary career may not belie the promise of this auspicious opening. Nor should the significance of Mr. Luke's attitude be lost upon the Government. The candid disapproval expressed by so cautious and well-deposed a critic affords a much better clue to the state of public feeling than a division list in which there isi more than the normal discordance between votes and convictions. The Minister who followed Mr. Luke in the debate — Mr. Hogg — was wise to leave him ' severely alone, but was not so happy in the positive aspects of his speech. He answered Mr. Mlassey's cbafi about his elevation to the Ministry with quite unnecessary seriousness, mentioning, among other things, that the occasion had brought him letters of congratulation from all parts of the country. We were among those who welcomed Mr. Hogg's promotion as thoroughly well deserved, but our ardour has since been damped by his apparent inability to adapt his tone and attitude to the responsibilities of his new position. In the House on Saturday, as previously on the platform^ he advocated the issue of bank notes by the State, just as he was wont to do when he had no higher responsibility than that of the Member for Masterton. On a question of such magnitude it is not desirable that a subordinate Minister should be allowed to conduct a separate propaganda of his own, and it is high time that the Premier defined the Government's policy on the point. It was chiefly by his services on the land question that Mr. Hogg was generally considered to have earned a portfolio, but the exigencies of Cabinet-making resulted in his receiving the portfolio of 'Labour, for which he had displayed no particular fitness. His presence in the Ca-binet is, however, a guarantee that the reactionary land policy to which many of their followers would like to see the Government committed Tgfll not be adopted. If his utterances on. this question may be accepted as more authoritative than those on the subject of a State bank, we may actually expect a genuinely forward movement? in this department. Yet we are bound to say that the tone of Jiis references to the land question was not well calculated to improve the prospects of reform. "The people were going to have their rights,'' said 'Mr. Hogg, "and the land question was going to be brought up again in a more formidable form than it had ever assumed before." We welcome the substance of this announcement, which evidently means that State rights are to be more- vigorously asserted ; but no good and some harm is done by the description of such a policy as "formidable." It is not by rousing, but by allaying, the fears of his opponents that the true reformer psoceeds. The fact, unfortunately, is that Mr. Hogg approaches the question in far too vindictive a spirit. We have no sympathy whatever with his picture of the large landholder gloating over the sufferings of the swagger and sundowner because he sees in them the means of swelling profits. We do not believe that there is any more of the Mephistopheles in the average runholder than in Mr. Hogg himself, but we do realise that land monopoly is an evil which tho State should endeavour to reduce, even though all monopolists are not angels of darkness nor all sundowners angels of light. Tho evil must be attacked in A broad and judicial .way, which should

sedulously avoid the wholesale imputation of . low motives to opponents and vindictive appeals to class feelings. Though the Government was anxious to bring the debate to an early conclusion, it would have been well to put up somebody to remove the bad impression made by this speech, but the chance was missed. By 45 to 29 Mr. Massey's amendment that Parliament be not prorogued was negatived, but the figures provide a very poor measure of the uneasiness in tho Government Party or of the damage that the neglect of the business of Parliament, will do them in the country.