YESTERDAY’S PARLIAMENT

Evening Star, Issue 20538, 17 July 1930, Page 3

YESTERDAY’S PARLIAMENT

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES [Pint United Press Association.] The House of Representatives met at 2.30. . , y „ , Replying to Mr J- A- Nash (Palmerston), the Minister or Defence (Mr Cobbe) stated that compulsory military training had been suspended for the present. The Government’s proposals would he fully placed before the House later. The following Bills were introduced and read a first time: —Meat Export Control Amendment Bill (Mi’ W. D. Lysnar), Rotorua Borough Empowering Bill (Mr C. H. Clinkard), Births and' Deaths Registration Amendment Bill (Hon. P.U\. de la Perrelle), Industrial and Provident Societies Amendment Bill (Mr 11. G. R. Mason), Evidence Amendment Bill (Mr H. G. R. Mason), and Dunedin Waterworks Extension Bill (Mr J. W. Munro). Explaining tho Divorce and Matrimonial Causes Amendment Bill, which was read a first time, Mr H. G. R. Mason (Auckland Suburbs) said the Bill was an endeavour to put the wife on an equal footing with tho husband in approaching the court. At present the place where tho husband was domiciled was the only (place where application could bo made. A husband could applv for divorce if ho had been < opiiciied in Now Zealand for two years, and it was proposed to put the wife on a three years’ footing. It was wrong in these days to regard tho wife ns merely the property of the husband, and the Bill was an attempt to do her justice. The only other important feature of the Bill was a provision that separation by any court (instead ot onlv the New Zealand court as at present) for a, terra of three years should be a ground for divorce. Mr H. G. R. Mason (Auckland Suburbs). when introducing the Shipping and Seamen Amendment Bill, said _it dealt with negligence as a cause of injuries and loss of life at_ sea, and was largely based on the subject matter of numerous petitions that had been before the House. . Tho Bill was read a first time.

The closing stages of the Address-in-Rcply debate, and the introduction and first rending of the Unemployment Bill, occupied tho remainder of the sitting, the House rising at 10.25 p.m.