PAYMENT OF MEMBERS.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1196, 1 February 1895, Page 33

PAYMENT OF MEMBERS.

From Our Special Correspondent. London, November 23

The question of payment of members of the House of Commons was revived the other day by a deputation to Lord Rosebery. It claimed to represent the whole of the trades unions of Great Britain, with a membership of a million and a quarter. Among the members of Parliament on the deputation were John Burns and some other Labour representatives. It would seem that the fund raised by working men’s “tanners” has not come up to expectations, and hence the appeal to the Premier. At the close of last session the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir W. Harcourt, in reply to a question by Mr "Woods, said the Government “ hoped they might be able ” to introduce a Bill next session for payment of members in pursuance of a resolution passed by the House of Commons last year. But a “hope ” is one thing and .a distinct promise quite another. In fact this may prove to be a “ hope deferred” which “ maketh the heart sick.” Having regard to the enormous legislative work to which Lord Rosebery is pledged there seems very little prospect of payment of members becoming a really live question before the dissolution, which is regarded as inevitable. Among the questions which block the way are the resolutions on the veto of the House of Lords, on which the Government seem resolved to appeal to the country as a strong trump card. But besides this there are Welsh Disestablishment, the Established Church of Scotland, the liquor question, the Irish Land Bill, registration reform (on which the question of women suffrage will be raised), the second ballot, and a variety of other matters, which various sections of the House and individual members regard as of paramount importance. But the deputation not only asked for payment of members. They want the State to pay the “ official cost of elections.” The prospect which such a contingency suggests is appalling. The present House of Commons comprises 671 members, and it may be estimated on a moderate computation that there are at least on the average three candidates for every seat. But with paymenc of members and their election expenses the aspirants for Parliament would probably be counted by thousands. The House of Lords has been contemptuously called a refuge for titled stupidity. The House of Commons might become the happy hunting ground of needy adventurers and demigogues. The arguments adduced by the deputation were of that kind with which colonists have been familiar for many years past in the successive struggles to carry the principle of payment of members. .In New Zealand it was settled long ago, and it has been adopted by nearly all the self-governing colonies, New South Wales being one of the last to adopt the system. The main argument in support of it has been that without remuneration to members for the time devoted to the interests of the country, only comparatively wealthy men and representatives of the capitalist classes would secure seats in Parliament, while poor men and advocates of the working classes, irrespective of their talents and personal fitness, would be almost wholly shut out. This was the .main argument adduced by Mr John "Burns, Mr Broadhurst and Mr Havelock Wilson, the leading spokesmen for the deputation. Mr Burns went so far as to assert that the principle of payment of members is in vogue in every other country but Great Britain, and he made the claim, not as a privilege, but as a right. Evidently, like other leaders in the ranks of the industrial classes, he regards remuneration paid to legislators in tlje light of a salary for services rendered. Mr Burns also enlarged on the humiliation inflicted on poor members by the expedients to which they were compelled to have recourse in order to provide for their maintenance. No doubt he had in his mind the expedient of sending round the hat for “tanners” and the methods adopted for the support of needy Irish members. Admitting that many men who would make excellent representatives are debarred from setting up as candidates under the present system, a great deal of stolid Conservative prejudice and dislike of innovation will have to be overcome before payment of members is adopted in England, and this applies with even stronger force to payment of the official expenses of candidates. Many leading authorities here are doubtful as to whether the system of remunerating members has proved quite an unmixed blessing in the colonies, and certainly the tendency in recent years in some of the popular Chambers at the Antipodes to increase the amount of the honorarium has not tended to enhance their reputation on this side of the world for unselfish patriotism. Lord Rosebery, in his reply to the deputation, frankly said the question was not only one of time but of money. He admitted that the claim “ in the abstract ” was founded on justice, but as to payment of election expenses, that was “another story.” Throughout the reply was bland and politely diplomatic, but it was couched in the usual stereotyped Ministerial form. He would lay the question before his colleagues, and it would “ receive consideration ” when the time came to frame the programme for next session. But before doing so he desired to know if the deputation wished the renumeration of members to be so large as to make it in itself an object or inducement. To this Mr Burns replied that payment on the same scale as in the Australian colonies, or from <£2so to .£3OO, would be “ satisfactory.” Here there was a general expression of opinion in favour of the larger sum, and something w r as said about free railway passes, which, it will be remembered, was a burning question some years ago in New Zealand and Victoria, Lord Rosebery re-

minded the deputation that the House of Commons numbers 671 members, while the colonial Legislatures are comparatively small. It did not,ho wever, seem to have much weight with Mr Broadhurst, who contended that £3OO a year is the minimum sum'on which a member of Parliament can live respectably. What the taxpayers will have to say to a vote of =£201,300, to say nothing of election expenses and free railway passes, remains to be seen.