Greymouth Evening Star. AND BRUNNERTON ADVOCATE. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 1928. END OF SESSION

Greymouth Evening Star, 9 October 1928, Page 6

Greymouth Evening Star. AND BRUNNERTON ADVOCATE. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 9, 1928. END OF SESSION

ZEALAND’S present Parliament held its final sitting today, and few outside the House will mourn that this particular session

has concluded. The final year of each Parliament is rarely noted for great achievements, but few ‘‘third years” have a worst record than the present. History has repeated itself, in witnessing sad waste of time in the earlier weeks, to be followed. by unseemly haste in disposing of the business, during the last few days. Such procedure is a national scandal, and redress does not appear to be in sight, as each political Party is as much to blame as the others. Publication will be made, as usual, of the list of bills passed by

the House since last June, but this 'catalogue will be marked more by quantity than quality. Few, if any measures of real importance can be claimed, and some of the bills

which are now Acts, were deprived ol principle clauses, to attain any progress. No Government, whatever its nominal majority, can do more than the House will permit, and to

be candid, there seemed to be no zeal on the part of Mr. Coates and

ns colleagues to force the pace, ’arl iamenta ry procedure needs unending, and departure made rom custom and tradition, before lie nation can hope for better hings. Meanwhile, it must pay up.

d look as pleasant as it can.

I : nder the circumstances, it is not surprising that Members of Parlia-

merit (Io not enjoy the prestige their high positions deserve. It, is a real honour to represent the people in Parliament, and to be of

those responsible for the country’s law-making, but very few Members appear to value such privileges. Visitors to the House, as well as Press correspondents, are frank in their criticism of the casual indifferent attitudes adopted by the Parliamentarians, no matter their polities. If they do not take their job seriously, is it any wonder that the public treat them similarly? When a session concludes, nice speeches are exchanged in the House, and critics are supposed to be crushed, but that camouflage deceives none, not even those responsible for it, and certainly not the nation for whose edification it is made.

To be fair to the Parliamentarians, it would be absurd to expect them always to be keyed to concert pitch, and to act and talk always as if the fate of the whole world depended upon them. They are but average men, or the majority of them are, and the mere fact of being elected to Parliament, does not confer on them super-human accomplishments'. It must be very difficult to concentrate attention on many of the speeches in the House, and the temptation to take things easy is not small. The remedy for the present state of affairs is difficult to find. Whether there are too many Members, whether the emoluments are too small to attract enough men of high calibre, or whether, as is sometimes stated, people get the Parliament they deserve, are questions that have been often discussed without worthwhile result. The fact remains, that whatever the cause, the nation has reason to be dissatisfied with Parliamentary procedure, and that although this grievance is of longstanding, no attempt at redress is made. The system, not the men or their opinions, is at fault. Perhaps, it is too much to expect something nearer perfection, and, at any rate, New Zealand has the cold comfort that whatever the faults of her Parliament, legislatures in some other countries, notably Australia, are worse. i