"INNOVATIONS"

Evening Post, Volume 50, Issue 50, 27 August 1926, Page 4

"INNOVATIONS"

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —I cannot refrain from putting on record my gratitude to the members of the Legislative Council for having thrown out that irreligious measure, the so-called Summer Time BiU. That more men should arrogate themselves the powers given to Joshua alone, is unthinkable. Oh! that these worthy gentlemen hud been in power when railways were first introduced to this country. Then we should now have been able to proudly boast that ours was the only country in the world that refused to adopt these unnecessary innovations. 1 ask, did our great-grandfathers have railways P.r summer time? No, they did not,

and they were wise and good men, who would certainly have had them "had they been advantageous. Had this iniquitous Bill been passed, think of the time that children would have wasted in playing on the beaches, when they might have been improving their minds by studying American films at the picture houses. Now that the principle has been established that oik clocks must be set to the sun, we must go still further and enforce it. I have made the disquieting discovery that, although our clocks are everywhere set to the same time, yet the sun rises in some parts of New Zealand threequarters of an hour earlier than in others. This is an obvious injustice and steps should at once be taken by the Legislative Council either to arrange for the simultaneous rising of the sun, both in the extreme east and extreme west of the couutry, or if this be found to present some difficulties, to insist on every town having its clocks Bet to its true solar time and to alter the railway time-tables accordingly. The feeble pleas put forward by the supporters of the Bill that for years tho change has been adopted in Britain, and on the Continent of Europe and found a success, even though all these countries have much greater farming interests than New Zealand, can be met at once by the crushing and irrefutable argument used by its worthy opponents: "This is New Zealand, and not Europe."—l am, etc.,

A GRATEFUL ONE.

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —I have just read with disgust the rejection of the above Bill by the Legislative Council. This will now bring to mind to thousands of New Zealanders the utter futility of what they have hitherto regarded as self-government. The people elect the members of the Lower House, but have absolutely no say in the election of the members of the Legislative Council, who have now taken upon themselves the power to reject this Bill, which has been passed by a good majority in the Lower House. Where, then, does this so-called self-government come in?

The members of the jjower House, as representatives of the people, decided to give them the benefits of the Bill. The Upper House now say that the people cannot get what the majority of them want, thereby destroying what New Zealanders have always prided themselves on, viz., "Government by the people, for the benefit of the people!" The rejection of this Bill now brings home the old question with more force than ever, i.e., the utility of the Legislative Council. The members of the Council are paid £315 per annum and the Speaker £720 per annum, and at the present time there arc 40 members, costing the people the small sum of £13,320 per annum. And for what?—l am, etc.,

26th August.

ONLOOKER.