PICKINGS FROM HANSARD.

Marlborough Press, Volume XIII, Issue 818, 11 September 1872, Page 2

PICKINGS FROM HANSARD.

ANOTHER “ COUNTERBLAST TO TOBACCO.” Mr Macandrew, in moving the adoption of a recommendation in the report of Library Committee, spoke of some “ honorable members who were shortening their lives by their narcotic proclivities.” WHAT TO DO WITH TIIE SUPERINTENDENTS. In the debate on Mr Reynolds’s resolution on Constitutional changes, Mr Fox said that Mr Reynolds “ did not not tell us what was to be done with the Provinces in each Island—what was he going to do with the Superintendents?” Upon this, Mr Reynolds interjected— “ Hang them!” AN ARMY OF OFFICERS. The Hon. Captain Fraser, speaking in the Legislative Council in the adjourned debate on Ministerial Offices, said : “ They had now eight gentlemen on the Government benches, with a regular army of 900 paid officers of the General Government, and an irregular army of 600 Provincial officers, besides the Constabulary colonels, captains, and other officers. He thought they had stopped short of field marshals, but they would have them ; and what had all of them to do ? To govern 250,000 people, a population equal to that of a fourth or fifth rate town in Great Britain. That was perfectly preposterous.” THE LATE MAORI PRISONERS. Mr Wakefield, in speaking to a motion by Wi Parata for the return of the confiscated lands to their former owners, said that some of the returned prisoners from Dunedin were still hanging about Wellington in a miserable state, dressed out in red and blue cravats, looking smart, but perfectly miserable at heart, moaning over their state, with no home that they could call their own, living upon sufferance among the least respectable portion of the tribes. He did not known that there was the slightest danger involved, but such a picture certainly did provoke feelings of commiseration, and a conviction that some enquiry should be made into their condition. A PROPERTY RATE. Mr Andrew, in the debate on the Highway Boards Empowering Bill, said :—“ In Tasmania, the‘Launceston and Deloraine Railway passed through a very fertile country, but the interest, on the outlay for that work had to be paid by the owners of property in the district, and the consequence, he had been informed, was that part of that country was now being abandoned. The same might be the case with regard to roads. They were told that if this proviso were not repealed, the Road Boards in the Province of Auckland could not carry on their functions. On the previous day he had been offered 300 acres in that Province, and some money to boot, on condition that he would pay the rates upon it.” lICW THE PROVINCES WERE FORMED. Mr Fox, iii speaking to Mr Curtis’s motion regarding the inadvisability of hastily altering the Provincial boundaries, said : —“ Let honorable members consider the terms on which these Provinces were formed when the Constitution Act was passed It must be within tiie memory of many honorable members that Sir Geo. Grey, with others who were not his Responsible Advisers, although acting as his Executive, went into a room together, and with a map and a pair of compasses ruled off the divisions that were to be Provinces. They hud nothing to go by, little to guide them, and they took mountain ranges, rivers, and other hardly known features of the country as boundaries of the six Provinces which they constituted.” THE PENSION SYSTEM. On the motion for the third reading of the Schafer “and Others Pension Bill, Mr Macandrew said before the question was put, he wished to relieve his conscience. Although he had given a tacit consent to the Bill, lie was anything but satisfied with it. He thought it was altogether on the wrong tack It would be much better if the Government would come down and propose to give a lump sum to all these individuals. Who could tell where this pension system was to end ? One of the greatest mistakes which could be committed by a young country was to give pensions at all. He would rather pay double the money down than bring about a system of pensions. Webb’s STEAMERS. In a debate in the Legislative Council on the Sau Francisco mail service, the Hon. Colonel Wlutmore thus compared Hall’s and Webb's lines : —The increased comfort afforded to passengers on the American line was not of much importance. He had travelled on both lines, ami could say, with regard to one part of the journey, from San Francisco to Honolulu, there had been a decided falling off from the Hall line. Hall’s vessels running between San Francisco and Honolulu were certainly better than steamers of the Moses Taylor class, which were now einemployed. The Hon. Mr Holmes, in the adjourned debate on the same subject, said : “ I have recently been in Melbourne, and know the opinion of these boats there. The general impression is that they are altogether unsuited for such a voyage, and unsafe as (passenger boats ; and I believe that even the smallest sum that could be named would not be given by the Government of Victoria to these vessels.” THISTLES A BLESSING. In the debate in the Legislative Council on the Provincial Powers Bill, the Hon. Mr Waterhouse remarked with reference to thistles “It would he well if all power of dealing with them was withdrawn from Provincial Councils. Thistles, instead of being an injury, were no doubt a blessing. He spoke on the subject with some degree of authority, and with some degree of regret; for tiie first measure he introduced into a Colonial Legislature was one which had formed the basis of all subsequent legislation on the subject in other Colonies. He referred to the South Australian Thistle Act of 1851. Since he came to this Colony, he had learnt that the thistle was an excellent fertilizer of the soil, and he had seen the measure he was instrumental in passing causing ruin in another Colony. He had seen the case of an unfortunate widow in Australia, who had failed J:o eradicate the thistles from her property, having the very property sold to pay the penalty inflicted upon her under that Act; and he had more than once reason to regret that unfortunate piece of legislation.” WANT OF SELF-RELIANCE IN NEW ZEALAND. In the debate in the Legislative Council on the second reading of the Tramway Bill, the Hon Colonel Whitmore said “He thought the people of the Colony were getting too much out of the way of trusting to their own enterprise, and were rapidly approaching the French principle, under which a man ceased to be a free agent in any single action of his life. He l.ad throughout objected to the principle of the Government undertaking so much commercial business, and he confessed that if this people was to resemble its forefathers, it was to be encouraged to exert itself.” The Hon. Mr Campbell, in the debate on the second reading of the Public Trust Office Bill, said : —“ He was of opinion that the Government of the country and the Legislature were entering on the management of the affairs of private individuals to a greater extent than was necessary. He did not see why, if the Government entered into such subjects as trusts and life assurance, they should not go further and manage the sale of the exports and imports of the country, and in fact become a purely mercantile Government.