Selections from "Hansard."

Marlborough Express, Volume V, Issue 241, 23 July 1870, Page 4

Selections from "Hansard."

IOCAXi induStexes. In the Legislative Council, on July 7<th— The Hon. Mr Seymour, in asking tie question standing in his name, said that be scarcely knew to what extent ho could enlarge upon it. The Standing Orders precluded a person asking a question from introducing; debateable ; matter;and as he could scarcely avoid doing so if he attempted to lead up to the question, he should 1 confine himself to as few - words as possible. He had been encouraged to place the question on the order paper, from the fact that the Government proposed to promote ipamigration and the construction of railwaysAlthough those things were very desirable, he hoped that the Government would see their way to going a little further, and that when they made the railways they yonin find it desirable to promote'industries in the districts through which the railways, were taken, because railways would not he payable unless there was a considerable amount of produce to be conveyed from, place to place. The introduction of imnii-.

grants into New Zealand would be highly desirable, but after the railways were completed it would be necessary for the wellbeing of the country that the population so Introduced should have an opportunity of pbeing absorbed in other pursuits. He was 'very glad to see that the Government had ' •communicated with the Government of the United States of America with reference to i°the introduction of wool upon favorable terms. He thought that steps might be advantageously taken in this direction with regard to other products; and, generally speaking, he thought that there were many •prays in which the Government might facilitate the establishment of local industries. He put the question in the hope Ifhat it might hereafter lead to a debate on Jithe subject, when it might be taken up by • persons who were much better qualified to ..fieal with it than he was. He begged to /ask, Whether the Government intend to any steps to assist the existing local ■'industries of New Zealand, and to encourage the establishment of new ones ? The Hon. Mr Gisborne would assure the honorable gentleman that this Government, as well as preceding Governments, had been quite alive to the importance of the subject he had referred to. It was the view of the Government that a number of industries in this Colony is essential to its future greatness. If a man were condemned to live upon one article of food, he would prematurely decay and perish; and so it was with countries. It was the varieties of local industries which converted a small community into a great nation. In order to show that the Government were not insensible to this policy, he would remind the Council that in 1868 the present Colonial Treasurer, who was not then a member of the Government, drew the attention of the of Representatives to the importance of having reciprocal treaties between the Colonies, so as to admit of the free interchange of certain products of those Colonies; and also to the importance of negotiating with the United States for the free importation, into that country, of Australian wool. The House adopted the resolution which was proposed on the subject, ,*and the late Government proposed to the Australian Governments that a conference should take place. That was arranged, and the conference was to have been held in October last. The present Colonial Treasurer and the AuditorGeneral went over as delegates from New Zealand, but unfortunately the conference did not take place on account of the unwillingness of the then Victorian Government to attend at Sydney. The Colonial Treasurer, however, had an opportunity of discussing the subject with the Governments of Victoria, New South Wales, and Queensland, and ascertaining their views on the subject, which he believed were favorable to a free interchange of products between the Colonies. His honorable colleague also pressed upon those Governments the advisability of inducing the United States Governinnnt to relax the heavy duty on wool. In the last session, on the motion also of the Colonial Treasurer, a resolution was passed by the House of Representatives that the Colonial Government should, for the purpose of encouraging the establishment of woollen factories in the Colony, call for tenders for the supply of woollen cloth and blankets for the use of the defence force for 9, period of three years. Tenders were accordingly invited, hut he was sorry to say that only one tendcr had been received, which was now under the consideration of the Government, the tenderer having been requested to send samples of the cloth to the Government. In order to encourage the colonial manufacture of cloth, the Government had purchased a considerable quantity of cloth which had been manufactured in Nelson, and which was now in store tor use when required. During last session, on the motion of a member of the late Government, the Hon. Mr Hall, a Flax Commission was appointed, in order that steps might be taken for the encouragement of the cultivation of flax. That Commission sat during the recess, and he believed that the report would soon he issued and placed in the hands of honorable members. If the Government could carry into effect any practical suggestions made by that Commission it would be very happy to do so. had just given notice tp_ move for a Coifimittee upon sericulture, in the hope that, after enquiry, it might suggest some measures for encouraging the introduction of qhe silkworm into the Colony. The modifications which the Government had Prosed in the tariff —which some people called protective duties, but which he centered to ho merely a transposition of revenue duties—-was - based on the principle tbaf those articles for the produce of which Gic Polony was eminently adapted, should We a slight increase of revenue duty placed tpon them, in order that encouragement might he given to - local industries, in the tope that they might be set on foot, and toe articles now imported be produced here

more cheaply, so that, even on economical grounds, the country would be benefitted simultaneously with the establishment of local industries. He thought that be had said enough to show that the Government were fully sensible of the importance of the subject to which bis honorable friend had called attention, and that they would lose no opportunity of which they could avail themselves for the encouragement of local industries in the Colony. EXTENSION OF THE EKANCHISE. Mr Carleton, the member for the Bay of Islands, has on several occasions this session spoken against the popular movement for obtaining the Ballot, and Manhood Suffrage. Upon the latter subject be made an unusually silly speech, quoting very largely from articles in an old Home magazine. He was succeeded by Mr Fox, in the following speech : Mr Fox : The House is no doubt much obliged to the honorable member for the lugubrious lecture he has just given us. We were getting on very much after the fashion of the happy family, and he no doubt thought it to be his duty to bring before us a melancholy picture of the evils which he says are connected with our institutions, and of the way in which they were brought into existence. It does grieve me when I hear any person standing on the floor of this House by means of the representative system which exists in this country—when I hear any person in that position rise for the purpose of defaming the institutions under which he finds a place in this Assembly, chuckling and gloating, I may say, over any foul picture which misrepresents the very institutions which distinguish the present period of the world’s history. I regret that any man of education, any man professing to be qualified to pronounce an opinion of what a statesman ought to bo, should be found in the nineteenth century to form his estimate of the character of free institutions from that well-known libel in an old number of the Westminster Review, which all of us have read long ago with feelings of intense disgust—that he should parade those foul pages before an Assembly composed of the same material, he would have us believe, as that to which the writer refers. Whether it was written by Mr Wilson, which I very much doubt, or by Mr Robert Lowe, who I believe also denies it, —whether it he the production of some gentleman smarting under some feeling of disappointment, or whatever may have been the cause of such a foul article appearing in the Westminster Review, the honorable member havinggloated over it with so much pleasure and delight, ought to have informed this House also of the able and most complete answer given to that article by as able a man as either Mr Wilson or Mr Lowe—by a distinguished statesman and colonist, Mr Michie —in a public lecture. That gentleman gave the most complete refutation to that base libel of the Westminster Review, over which the honorable member for the Bay of Islands has gloated with so much delight. There is one other feature of the honorable member’s diatribe on this and cognate subjects with which he has indulged us: that is, that he takes upon himself to inform the country, the House, and the world, through Hansard, ~of the great many blots in the history and existing circumstances of the institutions of this country. He speaks of the dreadful political diseases existing amongst us, of the frightful things done at elections, and imputes to the whole Colony and its institutions the greatest possible misconduct. I believe that he stands alone in that microscopic power by which he is able to magnify the smallest defects in our institutions, while at the same time he closes his eyes absolutely to the great advantages and benefits derived from them. The honorable member spoke, not long ago, of the frightful system of personation which prevailed, and which, he -said, was a disgrace to the Colony. All I can say is that in no Province I have been in—in Wellington, Christchurch, Otago, or any other Province in the Colony, except perhaps that of which the honorable member is a representative, have I ever heard any complaint of personation being a thing at all known ; and yet the honorable member rises and brands the nine Provinces of New Zealand with an atrocious political crime, of which no one else was cognizant but the honorable member himself. It is not known to exist except perhaps in the Province which the honorable member represents. Not one of the other Provinces had any knowledge of the national crime of which he brands the whole Colony as being _ guilty of perpetrating. It is not fair, it is not just, it is not generous—A will not say generous, because I do not expect anything of that sort from the honorable member—l say it is not worthy of an honorable member who tells us he has been for twenty years diving into deep wells to find truth at the bottom.

I need not further dwell upon his remarks. We have been in the habit of listening to such lectures from the same quarter, and I know that the impression made upon the House by his statements is nothing. But I am sorry that such wholesale and reckless statements, sown broadcast, should find their way into the columns of our periodical records, and that they may be read in other places, where their diatribes, decrying the principle of liberal government and every good and progressive movement of the present day, may not be so well appreciated and where the weight due to the honorable member’s talk may not be so well known as here. I shall not further allude to anything contained in his speech, or to the carping spirit in which he indulged If the speech had any force, it was contained in the extracts he read from the Westminster Review. He talked to the House out of the book, and the few words which he added were of very little cofisequence indeed. Late qui splendit unus et alter assuiter pannus. I have sufficiently answered the gross charges made, by the mention of Mr Michie’s admirable lecture. I have been betrayed into some warmth by the statements made to the House, and I shall now, without noticing them further, refer to the resolutions which I am not sorry the honorable member for Hampden has tabled, I quite agree with him that tne time has arrived when it might be well for us to reconsider the effect of the franchise as originally established in this Colony by Act of the Imperial Parliament. I do not complain or object to the form of franchise conferred upon us by the Imperial Parliament—it was necessary to give us a start in some way or another, and it could only come from the Imperial Parliament. The Imperial Parliament, acting with the advice of the Colonial Governor of the day, Sit George Grey, bestowed upon us what they thought was a proper franchise under the then existing circumstances of the Colony. I am not prepared to say that it was not a good and sufficient franchise when we received it; but the Colony has made great progress since then —it has grown in population, and it has grown in power and strength, and, notwithstanding the statements of the honorable member for the Bay of Islands, I say it has grown in political intelligencer-in practical'ability to grapple with the political problems with which statesmen have to deal. We have had long experience, and it has not been thrown away upon us. We are now, if not sadder, wiser men than we were when those institutions were first given to us. I admit that some change ought to take place in reference to the franchise, the only difficulty is as to what that change should be. For ray own part I have no absolutely rooted objection to the principle of manhood suffrage, although I do not agree altogether in the views expressed of the right to the franchise being vested in every “ tax-paying animal,” or in any person by virtue of his being a citizen. If the right of franchise is vested by the mere fact of a man paying taxes or being a citizen, not only has he the right of exercising the franchise, but he has the right of being a member of the consulting body which is to manage the business of the community. In the olden days the Greeks had their agorai, and the Romans their comitias, and the whole people took part in the deliberations and in the framing of the laws under which they had to be governed. That was bas.ed on the admission of an abstract right of every man to take part in the government of his country. The limitation of that right and the franchise came by degrees. First of all it was found that the indiscriminate consultation by the whole body of the people led to disastrous results. With the existence of the Anglo-Saxon race grew the system of representation which now continues to exist, and .accompanied with that has grown up to importance the principle of the franchise. But we do not rest our present institutions upon the abstract right of man or “tax-paying animals ” to be represented, but upon the decision which the convenience of classes, or which the logical deductions of the .human mind, have for the time been the means of establishing hard and fast, and which, too, may often have no exact fit? ness to the circumstances under which that line is fixed. It is not based upon the abstract right of individuals to be represented, but upon the of the case as judged of by the power which gave us a constitution. We may alter it from time to time, as circumstances may suggest; we may alter it to-day in the manner which the honorable member has proposed; but it will not be based upon an abstract right. The principle may at-times, perhaps, be modified by considerations of class interest, which may be an inducement to extend it in another direction. The great difficulty in this country arises from one or two special circumstances. In the abstract, it might be right to give the franchise to

every adult male who has resided for such a length of time in the country as to give the assurance that he has invested his nationality in it, and has indentified himself with its interests, and that he would be likely to form an intelligent opinion of some sort as to the manner in which its affairs ought to be administered. If this were entirely a new question, I should be prepared, in looking at it from a merely abstract point of view, to go as far as that; but we have in this Colony a particular class to which it is impossible not to allude, who remain here for a certain time sometimes for a long time—and yet who, from the nature of their employment, cannot have any intention of becoming permanent colonists, or colonists in a sense as to give them an interest in all those general measures which affect the Colony at large, I am alluding to the goldfields population, whose interests arc generally of a circumscribed character, and who may not participate in those larger interests which affect the future welfare of the Colony. Their interests may be, and are, of a more tangible nature. We have no assurance that they will continue to reside in the country, and it mav appear to many to be unnecessary, unjust, or inexpedient, to extend the franchise to thorn to the same extent as to those who come here to reside permanently, and to become part and parcel of the Colony, and to share in its future fortunes whatever they may be. In considering this question I think we ought to define the special extent to which the franchise should be extended to them. There is another class in this country whose circumstances are very peculiar. We have a considerable number of “ tax-paying animals ” who form a very large section of the North Island, and who, under the existing franchise, are almost excluded ; I mean the Natives. It is true they have the power to obtain the franchise if they choose to do so, by adopting a different style of living, and occupying dwelling-houses. They have in exceptional cases already elevated themselves to a position which entitles them to it. There is also now a special franchise which entitles them to return four members to this House. The honorable member for Hampden, pn his address to the House, made no allusion to the N atives. I hope that when he addresses the House in reply he will be able to state to the House that he has given the subject his careful consideration, and with a degree of statesmanship, as will enable the House to extend the franchise to that portion of the population. I must say, also, that the honorable member seems to me, in this resolution, to have stopped short of his own principles, in laying before us to its full extent his proposition for bestowing an abstract franchise, by not extending it to the female part of the community. There can be no doubt that women do pay taxes as well as men. If the payment of taxation is to constitute the basis of representation, the honorable member has not a shadow of excuse for excluding the other sex. Whether it is desirable that women should have the franchise entrusted to them or not, is a question upon the consideration of which I shall not now enter. I am merely pointing out to the honorable member that there is a want of uniformity in his system, on the basis on which he puts it, in omitting their claims. The resolution as framed by the honorable member, is defective in this respect, that, if carried, it would land us in the position of affirming one of two principles, but not indicating to the House or to the Government the extent to which they should be carried out. Befoi’e the honorable member can call upon the Government and the House to take such a step as that which his resolution indicates, he ought to be prepared to decide the extent to which he proposed to carry his principles, and he ought, moreover, to be prepared with a measure to carry them into effect. It is a very easy thing for an honorable member to table a resolution, and then suggest that a Bill be brought in ; but in this case something more is required. He should have prepared the draft of a Bill to submit to the House in the'event of the resolution being carried, so that the House might be able to judge what he means and how far they could adopt it. I shall probably vote in favor of the first resolution, and as for the others, I shall reserve them for further consideration. ' "