EARLY SITTINGS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CVI, Issue 12551, 12 July 1901, Page 3

EARLY SITTINGS.

THE NEW DEPARTURE. [Fnoii Our Coeh.espostde.vt.] WELLINGTON, July 11. Today the Order Paper contains the unprecedented! announcement for to-mor-row : " The House meets at 10.30 a.m. this day." Thus will Friday, July 12, be a record day in the Parliamentary history of this colony. Preliminaries were rather short to-day, but the time devoted to them is notable, by reason of the announcement made about tte new Commandant. From the description given by the Premier, Colonel Henry •appeara to be a first rate officer. The Order Paper, it is noteworthy, has been much shortened by the clearances of the last few days,' which have established a record for early- sessional days. The moral, the wags say, is that if you want to expedite Parliamentary busines'jj get ai Royal Duke to visit-us, and-delay the session long enough to give him a Royal reception in the four centres. Seriously, whatever the reason, business has so far received despatch beyond parallel of anything that has gone before: The'hope is general outside tho Houso that the new departure of coriy sittings will give an increase to this despatch. But in the House the hope does not seem to be cherished with any vigour, an astonishing thing in a House which has passed the new departure. In conversation, I find members fearing lest .committee wcik maybe'neglected, and obstructions by talking against, time festered. A few who would have the new system preferred to anything, speak as if they thought the House would be prepared to check the latter by establishing the closure, but I find the feeling against the closure so strong that the House would.prefer to go hack to the old 1 system of hours rather than have the " gag " at any price. It as urged, however, that the temptations to "talking out" will lie precisely what they are now, neither more nor less, the opportunities being afforded by the fact that a certain class of business will not go past 10.30 as now, and that the 10.30 "adjournment will not be a greater temptation than the present rule that no new business can be taken after midnight. The difference will be that under the new procedure the time spent at night under the old rule in "talking out" will be more profitably spent in bed. The committee objection is met by bhe answers that late and all night sittings being abolished, .the members will be mare fit for committee work in the mornings, and that if any more is "required, some arrangement may easily be made for emergencies, either by beginning earlier, or by letting committees in special cases jit for some hours at the same time as the House, or by calling them together after its rising. The impression, I think, will gain ground that 'these two objections are unlikely to be of much effect on the whole. The main hope is that the new departure was proved in many ways beneficial.