UPPER HOUSE DISCUSSES NEED FOR REFORM

Greymouth Evening Star, 7 October 1948, Page 4

UPPER HOUSE DISCUSSES NEED FOR REFORM

(P.A.) WELLINGTON, October 6. Legislative Council members of the joint constitutional reform committee were of the opinion that if the Council were to be reformed as a more useful branch of the Legislature of New Zealand, then they were in favour of reform, said the Leader of the Council (Mr D. Wilson) today, when the report of the joint committee on its deliberations on the future of the Council was discussed by the Council. Mr Wilson said that an overwhelming volume of evidence from Britain and from Australia was in favour of a

two-chamber system of Parliament, but some members of the joint committee said they had made up their minds that the Council should go and that they were not interested in the evidence. Speaking to his motion that the committee’s report that it had no recommendation to make should be agreed to, Mr Wilson said the Council members of the joint committee could have won a majority vote, but they felt that if a decision were not unanimous then it would not be fair to recommend it to the Government. If the Council should be reformed, and he did not think it needed reforming, the proposals made by the council would remove the possibility of any future Council impeding legislation, said Mr Wilson. Mr T. Bloodworth expressed regret that some members of the joint com- | mittee did not seem to realise the im- I portance of the question. All the evidence asked not for the abolition of the Council but for some type of reform. It had been said by some members of the committee from the House of Representatives that the Legislative Council could not judge its own- case but! members of the House had been judges[ of their own case with recent legislation that was of benefit to themselves alone. I

Because of the ramifications of political life there was now more need for the Council than ever before, said Mr Bloodworth, but there was room for considerable improvement in it. He hoped the Council’s proposals would receive proper consideration, so that in future there would be a Council more in line with modern times.

The debate, which was interrupted by the adjournment, will be continued tomorrow.