THE WORK OF THE SESSION.

Lyttelton Times, Volume LXXII, Issue 8902, 19 September 1889, Page 6

THE WORK OF THE SESSION.

The following is from the TimarnHerald : —When we compare the promise of the opening speech on June 20 with the accomplished work on Sept. 17, when the Appropriation Bill was passed, we are forcibly impressed with the extreme meagreness of the result. There is no Legislative Council reform, no Civil Service re-organisation, no Hospitals and Charitable Institutions Act, no amended law of copyright, no new Medical Practitioners Act, and no new law of bankruptcy. In fact, we may say that the programme broke down in every one of its essential features. Perhaps it is a good thing for the country that it is so, but it does not lie with the Government to put in a plea of that description. They called Parliament together and said that a certain schedule of legislation was necessary, and that they had prepared the Bills and would introduce them. They did so, and failed to carry any one of them of even third-rate importance. Yet, according to the Premier, he has achieved a great success, and he assured the leader of the Opposition that the Government stood exceedingly well with the country. Nay, more; in reply to another speech delivered by Mr Ballance when moving his resolution relating to the dissolution of Parliament, the Premier had the effrontery to say that the country wanted political rest, meaning thereby that prudent administration was the one essential, and that a programme of legislative progress was not called for. Why did he not preach that sermon at the beginning of the session, instead of putting into the Governor’s mouth the promise of a long string of reforms, for which it was announced that the time was ripe P We may be reminded that there was a good deal of legislation outside of the programme of the Governor’s Speech. That is so, but with one or two exceptions the Bills which the Government succeeded in carrying were not policy Bills, and were of no great importance. They made the most strenuous efforts to pass the Otago Central Railway Bill and failed ignominiously. The Criminal Evidence Bill, which effected important changes in the system of administering justice, was the work of a private member, Mr Hutchison, who represents the Waitotara constituency. On the whole the Government record is a miserable one, and their failures were so great and numerous that a stranger without a key to the position would be utterly unable to understand why a change of Ministry had not taken place.