TOPICS OF THE DAY

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXI, Issue 4477, 3 October 1901, Page 4

TOPICS OF THE DAY

POLITICAL SCANDALMONGERING

Groat surprise ig expressed by people in this city not only at the attack made upon Mr P. Garvey, the official in charge of His Majesty’s prison at Wellington, but also at the character of it. This is. to'be wondered at in gome degree, because; it has been recognised for seme time, past that Parliamentary scandalmonpcring has become the principal stock-in-trade of those members of the House who have foresworn party allegiance, and broken away from those disciplinary, fetters which have been devised in times past as a matter of public policy to keep public men of wayward dispositions in ohccK. It is not unnatural to expect loose and reckless charges based, on ex parte statements—usually emanating from, the perfervid imagination . of. some . “man with a grievance ”---to comefrom this source,- nay, rather, such things may be expected. A modest and well-meaning member of Parliament would naturally, in hearing charges made against a public officer of. long service and unblemished record, have submitted the facts to the Minister in charge of the department, with a view to having inquiries made,. and only as a Inst resort, after having failed to receive a satisfactory explanation, or to get the matters complained of remedied —would he have exercised his Parliamentary privilege and made known hh - intolerable sense of grievance from the floor of the House. But, as has been pointed out, these #re not the methods of the Parliamentary free lances. Actuated by no scqSo of political decency, they have become guerillas pure and .simple. Irreverent, flippant, volatile, having no regard for the rules of debate, for: good manners, for the respect,. which is due to older and more circumspect men, being, in short, irresponsible, in every sense that the word conveys, they carry on their cowardly'campaign against everybody and everything* ,Nothing is sacred to them; no reputation, is safe; none of those amenities which go to mellow and sweeten our public life and make frank and genial: intercourse possible between men of divergent, opinions are observed by them. This being'the case, Mr Garroy will not be the only public servant to be bespattered in the- periodical mudpelt. - To show the utterly unreliable nature of the charges so recklessly.made, wemay say that we have made inquiries respecting the letting of contracts for the Terhice .Gaol, to which Mr Hutche • son made reference in his speech on Tuesday night, and wo find .that on Dor cember 7th, 1900, Messrs Arnold, Lach-

man, Willcston and Kays, visiting Jus* tioas, opened the tenders for supplies for the ensuing twelve months, and tho respective tenders for coal, meat, broad and groceries were allotted to the lowest tenderers. This fact disposes of tho statement by Mr Hutcheson that ‘no tenders were submitted to tho visiting Justices.” For the rest, the Wellington Gaoler and his methods are well known to the public hero, and have been for a long term of years. His has not been a hard, stern, merciless janitorship. Ho is a reformer, oby instinct, though a" gaoler by occupation. If he has erred on the side of mercy and humanity, and has allowed his natural disposition to treat men as men and not as irredeemable pariahs to have sway, who is it that shall cast the stone ? If ho had wasted the publio funds in " medical comforts,” . and had not been able to show that “ Wellington Gaol is the most reproductive gaol in the whole colony ” his actions might rightly have been condemned ; .if ho had given prisoners less pocket-money on leaving tho gaol to enable them to. get clear away from police surveillance, and a fresh start in life, itmaig-- have been necessary for the State to have found tho necessary funds to increase tho gaol accommodation. As matters are, the publio may be relied upon to weigh Represontativa Hutcheson and Gaoler Garvey in the balance, and to decide which of them has been found wanting.

THE VENTURA'S VOYAGE. ■ The Secretary, Post and Telegraph De. partment, has received the following re. port from Mr A, P. Dry don, mail agent on the Centura, which, reached Auckland on Tuesday:-—“The s.s. Ventura, which left Auckland on 17th August last, reach* ed Page Pago on the 121st, Honolulu on the 27th, and San Francisco on the 2nd September. Through usual delays in liort,. mails did not leave for the East until the following morning at 10 o’clock. They , connected at Now York with the Campania,, sailing on Saturday. Through Sprecklcs's action in putting a special train, o ut of Chicago, the inward mails arrived to _ time, and the Ventura left San Francisco on 12th September, 11.15 a.m., reached Honolulu on 18th at 11.15 a.m., and left again on 19th at 9.33 a.m. Arrived at Pago Pago on 25th, at £0.45 p.m.; and left on 26th at 8.27 a-Un 80. ceived pilot Wre 5.30 p.m. The weather during Yound voyage has been good, the" indifferent time made being duo to poor, steaming, and ■ lengthy stoppages at way ports, and to crew.shipped during strike in San Francisco, which still con. turned, when wo left there. There are 360 bags of mails on board for New Zea* land offices.” ■

THE CITY ABATTOIRS. 'fjpe Minister of Lauds made a state* mem. yesterday of considerable local interest in regard to the Wellington abattoirs- Mr Wilford asked whecber the Government intended to settle the** question of tjs« site for pubiio, abattoirs xor this city, and whether the Minister had given ins approval for any particular site. He stated that lie understood the majority of the Council were in lav. our of the site of the Meat Export Com. pany’s works at iNgahauranga, and he wisned to know whether the Minister had approved of that jito. Mr Duncan, in -replying, said ho had not approved the INgahauranga, site. An hoc. mem* her: Why P Tnev Minister: Because 1 " consider the other gite much cheaper in every way. The Agahauranga site was in the middle of close settlement, and a public seaool was near by. The butchers ‘ who had approached him were in favour of the other site. Therefore, if the Council compelled the butchers to go to ' one site they objected to, and leave the site they would have, he did not'think the -Council was acting properly. Mr Wilford; Is your consent required? Mr. Duncan: I believe it is. The Minister . went on to say that he had taken the trouble to go and see the "sites him. self, and he preferred Banks’s site. The Abattoirs Committee of the City Council stated that the price of this site was prohibitive, but they had not shown him what tho price was. Agatov the cost of the other site was problematical; and he believed the local authorities would be standing in the interests of the city ' if they did not come to some arrange, ments by which tho butchery would fall intoi line. , THE MAIL SERVICES. A meeting of the council of, tho Wellington Chamber of Commerce was held yesterday afternoon, when the question of the mail services was thoroughly gone into. It was determined to memorialise the Government, and urge upon Parliament the desirability of making arrangements for a service via the Bluff: to connect with the Federal mail service, and , also to create/special facilities for the rapid distribution* of malison arrival in this colony. - ,