The Lyttelton Times. FRIDAY, MARCH 9, 1877.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XLVII, Issue 5009, 9 March 1877, Page 2

The Lyttelton Times. FRIDAY, MARCH 9, 1877.

We have certainly not been mnch edified by the report of the speeches which Messrs Pearce and Hunter, the members for the city of Wellington, have recently made to their constituents. Were it not that those gentlemen occupy somewhat an exceptional position as members for the Seat of Government, we should not have considered those speeches worthy of any special notice. Adventitious circumstances occasionally invest inanities with interest; and that fact is our apology to our readers for troubling them at all on this subject. Bacon has said that “ there are minds, “ like milk, which only bear one skim- “ ming.” Certainly, the minds of Messrs Pearce and Hunter, especially of Mr Hunter, when they conceived the ideas of which their speeches consisted, had undergone that skimming some time ago. More weakly and insipid productions could hardly have been exhibited. And they do not appear, as is very natural, to have suited the taste of the guests bidden to the feast, for in the full report in the New Zealand Times, a friendly newspaper, cheers or any indication of approval are very few and far between. And only a vote of thanks, without any expression of confidence, concluded the procceedings, although the retiring member, Mr Pearce, who is going to England, may naturally have expected a vote of confidence to have cheered him on his departure. The truth is, as we imagine, that the electors of the city of Wellington, a shrewd body and well experienced in politics, are tired of representation by a commercial clique, whose only cry is for loans and what it is pleased to call their reproductive expenditure, and whose only notion of reproductive expenditure is that circulation of money replenishes mercantile pockets. Political economy, in the school of Messrs Pearce and Hunter, is the broadcast diffusion of public money borrowed from foreign capitalists, and the absence of any tax specially affecting the wealthy class of the community. The poorer class must look to the interest of the loans. All that rich men are concerned in is to become richer by excessive public expenditure, so long as it can bo made to last; and true public policy, in their opinion, is to make it last as long os possible. “ I believe,” says Mr Hunter, “ our revenue will continue to increase.” Wo cannot see much sign at present of increase, but much of decrease. But, continues Mr Hunter, “ it will bo the “ duty of the Government to borrow in “ proportion to the increase of the in- “ come of the Colony. We should not, of “ course, borrow more money than wo “ can afford to pay the interest upon. “ If our income is increased by £50,000 “ a year, we would be justified in borrow- “ ing £1,000,000, and wo should spend “ the money in pushing on our rail- “ ways.” Hot a word about redaction of taxation, or reduction of expenditure. Circulation of borrowed money is the great Hunterian philosophy of the day. Mr Pearce is of opinion that the unity

of the Colony hM boon achieved by tho Abolition of Provincial totitatifms ,Wo are afraid that tho effect of that Abolition will work in a contrary dtfootton, ft „d that Wellington way expe«“oe that effect. Union ia effected by natural growth, and not by artificial force. Mr Pearce thinks that men will wonder how wo managed to exist bo long under Provincial Institutions. Well, considering that Provincial Institutions r i ftlo ®“ " ow Zealand from what it was in 1804.t0 what it was in 1870, wo think that tho wonder will bo that wo should wantonly have destroyed them instead of adjusting them to altered circumstances. We cannot aee anything m tho simile with whioh bo was so struck in a Southern journal, os to failures of joint stock enterprises on a Provincial basis, compared with failures of similar enterprises on a colonial basis, and in the analogy therefrom between Provincial and Colonial Institutions. Government is n °f 8 # j stock enterprise, except, perhaps, in hia mercantile eyes, and, moreover, our Constitution was Colonial, supplemented by Provincial self-government. It combined general supervision with local autonomy. Mr Pearce’s description of tho progress of the Oolony during the last five years is not re-assuring, though he meant it to be so, as a justification for continued and increasing loans. Our revenue has increased, thanks to large public expenditure, but it ia now decreasing. Out of eleven millions borrowed and spent during that time, wo have devoted little more than hall to railway expenditure, or to what we trust to be reproductive purposes. We have increased the population about 50 per cent, by immigration, at the public expense, but that addition has had little favourable effect on the permanent wealth of the Colony. Our imports have doubled, while our exports have remained stationary. A private individual might as well prove his increasing prosperity by showing his cheque-book full of blocks recording issues of money, while his banker’s book showed no corresponding iuoome. It might prove that he had been living extravagantly on credit, but it would prove nothing else.

Mr Hunter’s reason for being neutral in the coming contested election of a representative in the place of Mr Pearce, in tho city of Wellington, is peculiar. He informs the electors—what we think they might have known previously—that the candidate elected to fill the vacancy would become his colleague, He adduces that undoubted fact as a reason why he should be nentral. We cannot see the force of his argument, especially as he afterwards impresses on the electors the importance of the two members elected —he himself already being one—acting in concert with each other. To oar mind, that importance should indnee him, as much as the electors, to take an active part in discriminating—if discrimination, as we presame, is necessary—between the candidates for the high honour of becoming his colleague. If discrimination is unnecessary, that fact would be of itself a sufficient reason for his dignified neutrality, without his reason that one or other of the candidates would be his colleague. With respect to tho loans, amounting to £1,500,000 rAe.ftntljr arranged by the Government with the Banks of New Sonth Wales and New Zealand, it would have been more satisfactory if Mr Hunter, who seems to be behind the scenes, had stated what the terms of arrangement were instead of merely stating that they were favourable. Mr Hunter then informs hia audience that the Oounties Act is “ as well as could be expected.” He would have been more intelligible if he had prefaced this statement by an intimamation of the usual interesting event which precedes sack an announcement. At present, we have heard of no offspring from that Act. The rest of the Oolony will be glad to hear that Mr Hunter does not “ think it good policy “ for us Wellington men to attempt to “ get too much,” We quite concur in that sentiment, and in his opinion “ that Wellington has no reason to “ complain.” We do not, however, qnite understand his meaning when he tells his constituents that “ our policy should be “ a waiting policy,” unless it be waiting on Providence, or as we should say Improvidence, for the expenditure of future loans in that favoured Oity. We are afraid that it may wait long enough for good things to come from that source which it has already well nigh exhausted. It must be satisfied with what it has already got as its share of the spoils, and with the additional fact that Provincial Abolition has centralised in it the government of the whole Oolony.

There are at present two candidates, Mr Travers and Mr Hutchison, for the representation of the City of Wellington. Mr Travers is no stronger in the field of politics. He represented a district in the Province of Nelson many years ago, and he was a member for Christchurch from 1866 to 1871. We know nothing of Mr Hutchison, except that ho has become Mayor of Wellington. He may, for all wo know, have groat political ability and knowledge, and altogether be a representative of whom the City of Wellington would be proud. It is not within oar province to decide on their respective merits, especially as there appears to bo no brood distinction between their policies. But this, generally, we may say, that Wellington has before it a time of political trial. Abolished Provincial Institutions, and abortive County Councils have united, os wo read the signs of the times, two large sections of the Colony in a determination to seek largo constitutional changes. Provincial Abolition is but the beginning of the end. Those changes, if effected, will probably bo of material importance to the City of Wellington. Under those circumstances, it specially behoves that City to have as its representatives in Parliament, men, whose political ideas are not bounded by the Town Bolt and the Reclaimed Land, who do not, like horses working motive machinery, ever go round and round the same small circle, but men who con take liberal and comprehensive views, and will have weight and influence in the Colonial House of Representative*.