TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Evening Post, Volume LXXX, Issue 16, 19 July 1910, Page 6

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

If opportunity permits, the Prime Minister this week will The Referendum move in the House Fallacy. of Representatives the three propositions of which he has given notice, and the Government will thus discover the memoers' attitude in relation to the bookmaker and the totalisator, separately and conjointly. The large deputation yesterday, while calling plainly for the immediate execution of the legalised bookmaker, did not plead, directly, for an extinction of the totalisator. But a request was made for a referendum, and the opponents of • the machine are very confident of the result of an "appeal to the people." Horse-racing in New Zealand has charms for many thousands of people, and the totalisator has armies of votaries, but tho people who do not giv« two thoughts to the course and not one thought to the totalisator greatly outnumber the race-goers and off-the-course "punters."' Women's votes would go fairly solidly against the machine, and a little reflection shows that a very strong force, with splendid organisation and fighting ability, would be directed against the totalisator. It would not be a fair trial, and it would be a very undesirable precedent. The liquor issues ar6. decided by referendum, but tho remote totalisator and the handy open bar are on a very different basis. Generally speaking, government by referendum is a retrograde process, and is sham democracy. It is not government by the elect, the best available minds chosen by the people, but government by the many — and the many may not closely study the issues. This referendum agitation involves a redxiction to an absurdity — practically it amounts to a contention that the ruled, who do not specially study the intricate problem of ruling, are more competent to rule than the rulers. It is a declaration that Jack is not only as good as his master, but better. This system has degenerated into a farce in some of the American States, where the people have the right to directly initiate, revise, or recall legislation, and the Legislature may be a mere puppet, Co be jigged backwards and forwards by tho. strings of caprice. That isv not government by the people — the thinking people — but government by mob law. A referendum for the totalisator would be a prelude to a leferendum on Bible-in-schools, and possibly Sunday golfing and tobacco would be put on a ballot paper. It does not seem that the Labour platform constructed at Labour Auckland during the Discords. recent by-election has appealed, in its entirety, to the conference now sitting in the North. There lj<ive been several reconstructions during the past few years, and some of the planks are not yet securely nailed. The name of the organisation has been in a similar state of indefiiiileness. There has been the Tndependent Political Labour Party, the New Zealand Federation of Labour, and now the New Zealand Labour Party (with the word '"political" eliminated). The attempt to multiply Mr. M'Laren I in the House of "Representatives j has not had any appreciable success, and altogether it appears that the new party is just at ita beginning. There is a section of unionists opposed to the Trades Council clement, end fmther diversity is found in the Miners' Federation, which is Socialistic (the red-flag brand). Three years ago some of theLaboui leaders were inclined to lead their forces into red-flagdom. but belter sense prevailed. Instead of brotherly embrace, there was, eventually, a 'knocking of hosd* together. The iscal Styaialiit pipci wid &lia local, La-

bour paper have sprinkled acid on each | other, but the Labour paper has had the better of the argument. The desire of some men in the Labour movement j to stand hi political isolation has promoted confusion, misunderstanding, and not a little bitter bickering in the ranks. < Before the professing guides, philosophers, and friends have properly surveyed and mapped out the route to the political El Dorado of their dreams, they nave purported to be able to lead the pilgrims to "the apple-tree, the singing, and the gold," and the disillusioned pilgrims are beginning to suspect that they are invited to be pilgrims of the night. The disastrous railway collision at the i Richmond (MclThe Victorian bourne) Junction. Railway Disaster, which has resulted so tragically, serves to draw attention to the tact that the ! Victorian railways have had almost a monopoly of the serious accidents of iecent years- in the colonies. For years before the arrival of Mr. Tail, the expeit from the Canadian Pacific Railway, Canada, the Tailways had been, running at a heavy loss. 'When the Canadian, who came with the highest credentials, arrived, he had before him a task of considerable magnitude : to make the system pay. The chief commissioner has made considerable headway when it is taken into account that a large quantity of the rolling stock was obsolete and unsafe, and that many of the cockepur lines were absolutely impossible in a financial feense. In the process- of "mahing the railway*, pay" there have been veiy disquieting, accidents. When the Sunshine disaster occurred — a disaster in a very true sense — the commissioner was indicted strongly for overworking the various staffs of the service. In that case, it was said>, the stationmaster, on whom the responsibility for the accident was laid, had been on duty for something like eighteen, hours, owing to the heavy season. Not so long ago a. wheat train bolted down an incline in Western. Victoria, and crashed into a "dead end," loss of life again resulting. This time the brakes were found to be deficient. In the Richmond wreck (as cabled yesterday) the driver of the overtaking train slates he was tea minutes late, and that, owing to the fog ox otherwise, ho did not see the signals tUlright underneath them. He heard 1 no detonators (the commissioner said these were or should 'have been in rise), and the swiftly applied handbrake on thebrink of disaster was of no avail. Once again some one 'has blundered, and with unhappy consequences. Of late yeai's the comparative immunity from accident of the other States and our own Dominion ! system is in striking contrast to the record of the Victorian railways. It may be noted that some of the critics of Mt. Tail's management have declared that he is effecting economies at the expense of efficiency.