THE H.B. TRIBUNE. MONDAY, JULY 1, 1912. A SHAM DEMOCRACY.

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume II, Issue 168, 1 July 1912, Page 4

THE H.B. TRIBUNE. MONDAY, JULY 1, 1912. A SHAM DEMOCRACY.

In the swirl of party conflict the important affairs ..of State are forgotten and the country is allowed to drift. Parliament has met, and two days have passed in bickering. Points and counter points, thrusts and counter thrusts have occurred between the champions of the opposing forces, but no real work to benefit the State has been attempted c-r thought of. This battle for tbe “high places” will continue through the session and probably until the general election two and a half years hence. And the people are content. They are at least amused, even if the affairs of the country — their affairs and their country—arc allowed to slide backwards. What matters it to the people’s representatives that labour unrest is increasing. and that the lows of the country—laws which have been twenty years or so in the making—are so hopelessly useless that a body of workers, domineered and 'Erected by a handful of agitators, can hold np an important industry, as is the case at present at Wuihi ? There is a serious lesson to be learned from this political crisis. It is that the present system of Government is a failure, and that better results would follow if wo had a smaller Parliament which devoted itself to its primary duties, leaving the communi’/' to manage its own industrial and individual affairs. It is showing that Government interference in any department outside its rightful functions—the protection of life and property —i s likely sooner or later to end in disaster. Once the hand of Parliament is nut to the plough the furrows must be run out and the new crop tended and cared for if the (invest is to be good. Under our party e.mciii where (icvernments arc male and unmade by the whim cf the people the careful ploughing of t’’o i ’ 1 a n I industrhil field is aLn * mr -- b’c There are poliio < n '1 sides pul'mg tills

n ,’i 'tin i nil the result that tie d ’ - f If is of tl"- team are swayed fivm tbp hnp marked out ami they l< . i I 11 f object i f their work io 1 * 11 ■. • ’’ l.r-'-p it light '-hitch i. 1 the handles. Is not this

what is happening now ? The Arbitration Act was marked out to prevent strikes, and it would have served its purpose if the cowardice of the Government had not prevented the Act from being enforced. The groups collected and pulled ; labour erganications collected and pulled, and the law is defied with impunity. Another consequence is that New Zealand has a hybrid Ministry, leading a hybrid party, which is ready to repeal or amend old laws or pass new legislation, not in the best interests of the country, but in those of party and of self. Thus has our boasted democratic Government become a sham. Instead of a democracy we have an autocracy, a class legislation with men in power who arc ready to wink at the wrong doing of those who put them there. We have a Government which is pledged against monopolies and trusts. It has even set up a commission Io en-■ deavour to enquire into trusts. They say, arid rightly so, that trusts are not to have the advantage over individuals, the individual’s supremacy must prevail. But their actions reverse their policy, and in their majority mongering greed they protect and foster the labour trust, which at this moment is clogging the wheels of industry at Waihi, and [ driving independent workers and [ their families to Australia. Depend upon it the time is coming when public opinion will demand legislation against this sort of thing, legislation in favour of neither capitalistic nor socialistic interests, but j legislation for the best interest of | the whole communit}-, not tolerating I any interference with private enterprise, but maintaining law and order and leaving the rest of the people to themselves.