Evening Post. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 1918. THE LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL

Evening Post, Volume XCV, Issue 43, 19 February 1918, Page 6

Evening Post. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 1918. THE LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL

The death of the Hon. William Morgan makes another gap in the already attenuated ranks of the Legislative, Council, and increases the urgency of the call for action on the part of the Government. For the Legislative Council, as for the House of Lords, the alternative has long been " mend or end," but there is an overwhelming preponderance of opinion that ending is out of the question until some other check is provided against hasty action on the part of,the House of Representatives. By the . Legislative Council Act of 1914 it was decided that the time had come for the abolition of the nominative system of appointments to the Council, or, rather, that it had very nearly come. The Act was not passed by large majorities, nor did it command an authoritative support, for the' Reform Party, which during its long period of Opposition had made much legitimate capital out of the abuses of the system of nomination, was far from wholehearted in its acceptance of the substitute proposed. It was not unreasonable in the circumstances that the operation of the measure should be postponed till after the then impending General Election, and as the General Election was followed by a truce between the closelybalanced parties and the formation of a National Government, the further postponement of the operation of a measure on which no compromise was possible became inevitable. It is clearly out of the question that so contentions a measure should be "brought into operation until the parties are at arm's length once more, but by that time, unless the Government takes action, the present Council will have dwindled to an extent quite incompatible with efficiency.

It was in 1885 that the Legislative Council attained its ■ maximum strength with a membership of 53, but, except in the following year, it has never been so large since, nor is it desirable that itshould be. lii 1885 and 1886 the House of Representatives comprised 95 members, so that the Council at its maximum was only a little more than half the size of the House. The unwritten law whicl^ recognises this proportion of one to two as reasonable has been given statu-' tory recognition in the Legislative Council Act of 1914, which gives the Council forty members, being half the number constituting the House of Representatives since the Representation Act of 1900. Measured by this standard, the Legislative Council is now far below its proper limit. In August, 1915, its membership had fallen to thirty-seven; the death of Mr. Morgan reduces the number to twenty, which is considerably less than a third of the strength of the House of Representatives. Indeed, if the necessary allowance be made for absences on the score of age and infirmities, it will be seen that the working strength of the Council is now not ,more than a fourth of that of the House, or just half of what, as we have said, is now recognised as the reasonable proportion. Whether the nominative system is. good or bad, we can surely all agree that while the system endures the Council must be kept in a proper state of efficiency by the necessary nominations. :

Under ordinary conditions a Government would be eager to seize the opportunity for the exercise of its patronage, and, though it is to the credit of our National Government that it is free from this kind of eagerness, a. delay beyond the end of the present recess could not bo put on the side of virtue. It is virtuous to abstain from the making of bad appointments, but it will be more 1 virtuous still to make the necessary number of good ones. There is no need to say that the appointments must not be limited to persons of the right colour. One colour should be as good as another in the eyes of a Government composed of representatives from both the principal political parties, but such a Government needs to be warned just as much, as any other that political colour should be entirely ignored in making the appointments. Bi-partisan appointments, to use an American term, would be jusj; as bad now as were partisan appointments under the party Governments that prevailed before the war. There is abundance of talent available if the Government will only take merit, capacity, and the public interest for their. guides, instead of the desire to reward political service already rendered, or to ensure that it will be forthcoming in the future.. If the Government will look solely to the promotion of national efficiency it will justify its title of National Government, and redeem some of the credit which iE has lost by appointments that have failed .to give satisfaction.