AN EXPLANATION

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 6269, 24 July 1907, Page 7

AN EXPLANATION

LAMPS ON VEHICLES BILL. MR MAJOR’S MEMORANDUM. The following is the "‘Hansard" report of a speech mad© in the House of Representatives on Friday, July 19th: Mr Major (Hawera).—l would ask your permission to make an explanation to the House. The explanation arise© out of an incident in connection with the memorandum to the Lamps on Vehicles Bill. That, matter was yesterday discussed in the House, and on my arriving in the House I discovered the Premier with this document In hie hand. Now, I have not, what I may term a point to moke. I have simply the truth to state, and I hope my brother members of the House will _ realise, when 1 have made my explanation, that i nave told tho absolute truth so far as this incident is concerned. This measure, which was introduced by myself into Parliament, passed its second reading in the British House of Commons on the 15th March last. I brought this document with me from Hawera among others, and being asked _by _the reader if I would supply him with it, I placed it in am envelope, and sent it to him. When I subsequently received from him a proof of the Bill, the memorandum was printed upon the front page, and bore under it the name ’’Q. W. Salmond." This had been excised by the reader for the reason, I discovered afterwards, that the Printing Office had placed that name there without authority. In fact, I have since learned from the reader, and I have no reason whatever to donbt hie word, that the Crown law officer has no knowledge whatever of this measure, nor _ bad he ever seen it. I returned this (typed copy Bill) to the reader with this endorsement across the top, "Eight. Thanks.—C. E. Major." I felt for the moment under an obligation to the Crown law officer (that was not due to him as I discovered afterwards) for having had the goodness, in my opinion, to place the memorandum there. The difficulty that arose in connection with the statement made by the honourable member for Motueka was, so far as my memory serves me—l am ready to be corrected if I err in this matter, and if I err I do so in entire and absolute innocence—was this: The honourable member for Eiccarton eaid to me, ‘‘Lii. the Crown law officer place that tag to your Bill?" to which-1 replied, “Yes ' The honourable member then asked, "What do you think of it ?” I said I was quite satisfied with it. The current opinion in the House was that the present law draftsman was placing tags to most of the measures submitted to the House. It seems now that these memoranda are only placed upon Government measures, and not npon the Bills of private members,, so that this Bill never Came within ’ that gentleman's knowledge at all. I hare no recollection of speaking to the honourable member for Motueka, but I understood be was either sitting near or speaking to the honourable member for Eiccarton when that honourable gentleman asked me this question. I may say that I am still satisfied with the tag. Well,, on arriving in the House yesterday afternoon somewhat late, this matter was under discussion, and the Bill that I now hold was in the hands of the Eight Hon. the Premier, who asked me if 1 was responsible for having sent this to the reader of the House, I _ asked if I might be permitted to see it, and the moment I saw it opened I discovered the writing at the top, and the typing which had been done at Hawera,' which is on view at the present moment. I concluded that tho matter was then settled, but since then some gentleman who writes under the nom de plume of “Bird's-eye View," makes a publication that is quite erroneous in every sense. Personally, I do not care how ungenerous a writer may be, but I do not like untruthfulness in a statement, and this statement is absolutely untrue. It would appear that I am charged with the offence that when this charge was made against- the gentleman in question, 1 sat silent in my 'seat, and by sitting silent was guilty of moral cowardice, because I did not make any effort to (protect the Crown law officer from the unjust imputation made by the honourable member for Motueka. At that time I was under the belief that the Crown law officer had drafted and attached the memorandum. It has since transpired that the objectionable memorandum had passed through the House of Commons, and that no one had taken any exception to it, and that apparently it was there regarded as a fit and pro? per document in that august assembly to attach to the Bill. However, the memorandum seems to have raised the ire of some honourable members, and some papers in the colony. The "Evening Post 5 ' was the first 1 to take exception to it, or rather, to discover some form of humour in it. 1 failed to see any humour in it myself. I would like to quote from the newspaper comment 1 have referred to, because I want to protect. not only myself, but other mem- i bers, who are all subj eot to an attack in the same way. The writer says: “Making had jokes, and fathering them on others, is, not a Erooeeding to he indulged in with alight eart.” Now, no joke was ever intended, nor was any joke ever perpetrated. The last idea in my mind was to perpetrate a joke on the Crown law draftsman of this colony. In doing so, I would only have been perpetrating a joke upon myself, because it must have recoiled upon myself, after having stated to many members of the House that I was quite satisfied with the tag or memorandum, as the case might he. Now, I take great exception to this misrepresentation, because. although a statement like this, so injurious to a public man, is not published in a paper in the district 1 represent, still all these comments will gercolate to the press of that district, ay I put it in this way to show you what value .there is in this statement. I have a memory of an occasion, not last session, but this session, when some statement was made under the same nom de plume, with respect to four members who spoke upon the Address-in-Eeply, saying their comments were worthless, and that no one would take any heed of them, although those members had spoken at length. But a few days afterwards there was a retraction in the same paper, by printing an excerpt from the speech of one of the four members’ speeches, occupying almost a column and a half, thereby giving the lie direct to the statement made by this gentleman writing under this nom,de plume. What value can be attached to statements of this nature? Yet, when once the He is told, it is a difficult matter indeed to obtain its retraction. Now, if this gentleman's mind is not too dirt-clogged by his lapse into this form of misstatement, I hope he will take the opportunity of making some retraction, for the wrong he has perpetrated upon myself, particularly of that portion where the inference is drawn that I was ready to allow a slur to be cast on the Crown law officer.

An hon. member: Who should make amends?

Mr Major: If X have been guilty of any offence, I have been guilty of the offence of honest inadvertence. Nothing else. Thai is the explanation I seek to make. This form of cheap wit and sneering satire, though it may be pleasing to. a few people who care to read that description of literature, may st the same time, prove injurious to those it attacks with the weapons of misrepresentation. I do not care how ungenerous or severe a criticism of myself may be. All I ask is that it may be truthful.