POOR PEOPLE.

Marlborough Express, Volume XVI, Issue 54, 5 July 1881, Page 2

POOR PEOPLE.

Tee honorable member for Mongonui and Bay of Islands was very; funny during the discussion on the Becoajl *" reading 01 the Hospital and Charital&k Aid Bill. Mr Liuidon first related how a number of men had refused ' seven shillings a day because they had to feed on pork. Then he stated that many persons could make a good living out of growing sweet potatoes, the Parliamentary name of which he did not know. If they did this, there would be no talk about the'sick and destitute. He set the House m roars when he stated that he was m a position to speak his mind because he had no constituency, his constituents having deserted him and having selected another man. The amusement increased as he proceeded. How could, he asked, small districts afford to support the poor '/ Onehunga was the home of the sick and destitute because it had good land and more grass on the streets than the cattle could eat : and then there was Howick with a Highway Board possessing a revenue of only £16 per year to disburse m a place where the people were poor and lived upon timber — kauri timber. As a means of getting over all difficulties he suggested that every man should go to work for two or three years, and pay off the national debt. Paupers he held to be worse than Chinese, because they didn't leave the country. He hadn't read the Bill, but if the Government would come down with a vote of £100,000 or £200,000 they would get his support. A poll tax was no good, because when people wouldn't pay a dog tax they would not be ready to pay for the sick.