Evening Post. FRIDAY, AUGUST 30, 1912. THE ELECTIVE PRINCIPLE

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 53, 30 August 1912, Page 6

Evening Post. FRIDAY, AUGUST 30, 1912. THE ELECTIVE PRINCIPLE

The Legislative Council has done the right thing with the measure for its own reform. A body entirely composed of members who owe their position to nomination naturally looks with suspicion upon a proposal to make election by the people the sole title to membership. An enthusiastic reception of the Legislative Council Elections Bill was, therefore, not to be expected from the Council itself. "The rude invasion of Gallic tumult" Was hardly less acceptable to the venerable Senators of ancient Piome than is the democratic invasion proposed by the Government's Bill to a considerable proportion of bur own Senate. And even those members who realise that reform of some kind is im--peratively needed have their doubts as to one portion or another of the drastic programme submitted by the Government. It is fortunate, however, that doubts and fears and prejudices have not driven the Council into a' blind or obstructive opposition to the Bill, and that tho secoud reading was carried yesterday by a throo-fourths majority. Wh&tovM urny be the uitimtta {tie of

the measure, the Cduricil will At any rate be free from the reproach of having refused to consider it. That fundamental changes will be made in thd Bill before it emerges from Committee is highly probable* In view of the reservations which have been iriatle' by tine speaker after another" it ttbtild be Unreasonable to treat yesterday's vote as meaning anything more than that a' majority of the Council is prepared td give the elective principle some scope in determining future appointments. In the speech with which he moved the second reading of tlie Bill Mr 4 Bell expressed his general readiness to accept amendments, but on One point he offet'ed ho hope of compromise. To the Government, he said, election meant only one thing — election by the direct vote of tho people, and he could, not adedpt anything in the sha£e of a secondary election, 'the debate has^ however, shown that a 6on•iderable number of those who vbted for the second reading of the Bill do not favour the method that the Governmeiit regards as essential, and the ultimate result is therefore very uncertain. We aro quite at one with ths Government in regarding direct election as the only kind of election that is worth considering. Indirect election Ojlehs tho door to all sorts of indirect influences that may defeat the object of a representative system. ' The Hon. Mr. Stevens suggests tha establishment of an electoral college, comprising the members df botli Chambers, but we see no reason for believing that ouch A body would yield any better resUltti iLan the present system. Is it possible to imagine that a constituency of M.P.'s and M.L.C.'s would rise superior to party spirit? The very thing that has degraded the Council during the last twenty years would continue to operate much as before. The electoral college would do at the instance of the Ministry of the day just What the Governor has had to do hitherto, and we see no point in' altering 1 the machinery if Ministerial favour is still to be the controlling force. Of equal importance with the question of election, and of much greater difficulty, is the adjustment of the relations between the two Chambers when both can claim direct authority from the people. This serious gap in the Bill was filled by Mr. Bell yesterday in a way that will remove nittch urieaßiriess< He proposed to provide against a deadlock by the insertion of clauses borrowed from the provisions of the Constitution Act of the Commonwealth. These clauses provide that if the House passes a Bill and the Senate rejects it or fails to pass it, Or passes \t with amendments unacceptable to the House, and after an interval of three months the process is' repeated, the Governor-General may dissolve both Chambers. If after the dissolution the difference continues, a joint sitting of both Chambers may be held to adjust it. The Commonwealth has not yet had occasion to put this machinery into operation, but it seema to offer a reasonable solution of tho difficulty. It is, however, worth considering whether a joint sitting of both Houses might nob be held prior to the dissolution as well as after it. Where the majority was large in one Chamber and small iri the other, ' the necessity for a dissolution might thus be avoided altogether.