PARLIAMENT.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LIII, Issue 9435, 6 September 1907, Page 5

PARLIAMENT.

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 5. LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL. WELLINGTON, September 6. The Council met at 2.30 p.m. On the motion of the Hon. Mr Macdonald, it was ordered that there be laid on the table copies of all contracts for advertising in connection with railway stations in the colony. INFANT LIFE PROTECTION. The debate on Dr Collins' motion to cosider the provisions in force for the protection of infant life was resumed by The Hon. Mr Beehan, who held that the question of a living wage entered largely into the subject under discussion. By improving the position of married men, something might be done to improve the condition of things. He trusted that the position of the declining birth rate and the marriage rate, and the awful destruction of infant life, would soon be a thing of the past. The Hon. Mr Callan said the worst evil of present-day civilisation was the low estimate attached to family life. He considered the facilities for divorce had resulted in a lessening of the regard for many of the duties of social life. Divorce was becoming a crying evil. The question of the non-birth of children or the destruction of child life was one of the most perplexing of modern times. Seeing we got little immigration, it was all the more important that we should encourage and foster infant life.