THE Mount Ida Chronicle AND St. Bathans Weekly News. SATURDAY, JUNE 25, 1881.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume XI, Issue 612, 25 June 1881, Page 2

THE Mount Ida Chronicle AND St. Bathans Weekly News. SATURDAY, JUNE 25, 1881.

The amount of talk that honorablo members indulged in prior to the session was probably greater than on any previous occasion. Generally,' the speeches are delivered at various times during the recess, some being left till the approach of the session. This year nearly every member delayed his address till the last moment, and the consequence was that the papers for a short, time overflowed with politics. On the whole the speeches were very poor. The " do-nothing " policy of the Government gives members -little to talk about. The speech which" naturally attracted most attention was the Premier's. It is impossible to remove it from the general classification.' It was mainly taken up by criticisms of the Opposition. The fact is generally admitted that new legislation is repuired in many ways, but we can discover but little in the Premier's speech with reference to the subject, beyond hia statement that he intends to trump : up and reintroduce several Bills lost; last session—such as the Licensing, •Chinese Immigration,and Hospital and Charitable Aid Bills, which might have been, carried last session had the Government chosen, though they would have had to be amended very freely, which will be done now. Tor entirely new legislation we have a Bill to alter the Constitution of the' Legislative Council, a Fencing Bill, and perhaps a Fisheries Bill. T e first has been voted to be based on a wrong principle ; the second is " parish " work ; and, as far as we know, the third is not required. His greatest admirers having only been able to say that the speech showed " common, sense." it certainly showed no uncommon sense; in fact, we think it might very properly have been called commonplace. One thing was made manifest, that but little could be expectedfromthe Government in the way of new proposals. The work of the session, so far, has been consistent with the forecast of the speech. Nothing but stock measures have been, introduced; and we, are informed that when the Government found that members were'. expressing a desire to have something done in the matter of local Government, Ministers, endeavored to resort to their usual trick of throwing the responsibility of takingthe initiative on a Committee or Commission. It does not appear whether they will be successful in ljhis., In anycase there is little to be 'expectedfrom'them; and. 'we shall indeed be surprised •if they outlive the session, unless-their, opponents choose to let them retain their ' seats j for'the purpose of making their shortcomings the basis' of an election cry, which they' would be quite justifiedin doing. The only other speech, we need to refer to is that of our own member Mr de Lautour. The speech he' delivered in the Town Hall, Naseby, on the 6th inst., was of a very different nature to those we have been in the habit of hearing from him. Hitherto he,has exhibited the most lively interest in questions affecting the district. Now he appears, to regard" them as beinc but little, if at all, worthier of cbi£ ,sideration than those questions in which we are not so much interested. The speech to which' we allude might have been, delivered in the, "North" Island or in the South ; in an agricultural district or a mining. It had scarcely more reference to Mount Ida than tj any other electorate. Mr de Lautour may have been unwilling to say much, on account of his peculiar position as one of the leaders of the Opposition ;. or he may have been disinclined to unbosom himself too freely because the elections were close at hand. Though there was little that could be found fault with in what he said—the weakest point, in our opinion, being his favoring Mr Stout's idea of not giving any more freeholds—yet he omitted to say a great deal that it was expected he would say, and hia speech did not evoke that hearty and enthusiastic approval which has followed most of his previous utterances. Considerable allowance must be made for the fact that his sympathy with the district must naturally have commenced to decrease when he ceased to live in it. It must be admitted that there is no man m the present Parliament so fitted to be our representative as he; but still we must regret that the sympathy of the member should appear to be on the wane just at the time when, of all others, it! should be most active. We hope yet to see Mr de Lautour return among us, and again take an active part in guiding and administering our affairs.

A notice inserted in our aiivertising columns by the Registrar of Electors, informing those who are not on the Roll that immediate application is necessary, should not be disregarded. There are two particular reasons why every man who is qualified should register; and here we may say that every male of the age of twenty-one years, who has resided in the Colony, for twelve months, and in the district, on the Koll of which he applies to have his name placed, for six months, is entitled to register. The first of these reasons is that it is proposed to bring in a Re-distribution of Seats Bill, and if pur Electoral Roll does

not contain more names than-it at present does we run no small risk of having our district amalgamated with some other. It is, therefore, of the utmost importance that every man should register; and, to serve this object, registration should take place at once, for the Bill of which we speak may be brought in any day. The other reason is that by Section 30 of the Act, a new or supplementary roll has to be printed, if there are a number of new applications, prior to a general election. As'it is anticipated that a general election will take place in November, the printing of the roll cannot be much longer delayed. Persons who wish that their names should be on it should therefore apply at once. To facilitate matters we have despatched a number of forms of application, and copy of the roll, as it at present stands, to one business place in each, township, the proprietors of which will no ..doubt be glad to show the roll, as follows : Mr Laverty's, Hyde; Mrs Barber's, Hamilton; Mr Turner's, Blackstone Hill; Mr Pyle's,■ St. Batbans ; Messrs. M'Cullough \ and , Sheppard's, Cambrian.; Mr Edmonds', ' Serpentine ; Mr John, .: Malloch's, Kyeburn ; i and, Mr Messent's, Kyeburn Diggings. We have also forwarded forms to Messrs. Ewing and Purton,' St. Bathans ; S. Inder and William "Wade, Blackstone Hill; P.Howard, Rough Ridge; John Cogan, Serpentine; T. Poster, Hamilton; Connolly and Matbewson, Hyde ; Currie, Kyeburn ; Forgie and Williamson, Kyeburn Diggings. We have forms, and a complete roll, at our office, where we shall be glad if anyone who is not on the roll will call.