SHAMREFORMERS AND THE COUNCIL

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVI, Issue 8222, 10 September 1912, Page 6

SHAMREFORMERS AND THE COUNCIL

A Bill to give effect to the Government's proposals for an elective Upper Chamber will bo introduced into tho House of Representatives, put through all its stages, and sent on to the Council in the ordinary course. Should the measure pass through the Lower House, tho argument cited against the Bill in the Council that the reform of that Chamber is not demanded by the people of the country will be at least partly met.

Thus tho Government’s local journalistic mouthpiece in yesterday’s issue. It is further indicated that the Prim© Minister intends to stake his political reputation on tho issue, and that he is prepared to keep Parliament in session until November, if necessary, in order to secure tho passage “of this and other important measures.” There is something quaintly Gilbertian in tho make-believe of such a situation as this. Here wo have a Government professedly anxious to democratise tho Second Chamber. In fact, it alleges •that it has had a mandate to democratise the Second Chamber. Its first move in this direction is not to consult the representatives of the people from whom the mandate has allegedly come, but to foist on to tho Legislative Council itself a measure so tm- , workmanlike and impracticable as to merit nothing but rejection. The physicians of the Upper House having refused and neglected to heal themselves to death in the manner prescribed, the Lower House is to be called into consultation with a view to forcing tho recalcitrant “old men” to swallow the Massey-Bell bolus. The representative Chamber—which is not by any means representative according to scientific standards—is to be asked to overlook its own claims to reform, while it creates a measure giving another Chamber superior status. The Prime Minister proposes to coerce his following into bringing the Upper House into immediate touch with the people, but for some tactical reason undisclosed lie is averse to providing machinery for bringing the Lower House into immediate touch with the*people. It is threatened that if the House of Representatives rejects this extraordinary proposal, Mr Massey will flood the Upper Chamber with nominees. To flood the Upper Chamber with nominees is to do something which is condemned by every line and paragraph of the incongruous measure which the Legislative Council has just rejected. Incidentally, it may be remarked that the Prime Minister has placed! himself in ' an awkward predicament by the situation which, he has thus created. If the House or the Council rejects this Bill for tho reform of the Upper House ho will have to find fourteen or more nominees for the latter Chamber before next election. Where are these men to com© from? If they come from the Cabinet’s electoral bodyguard they will consist largely of the opulent and privileged classes. But if Mr Massey still perseveres with the idea of impressing the populace with the notion that he is the real friend of Labor and Radicalism, ho will have to appoint quite a_ number of people who are not the friends of the people who, are the friends of tho Prime Minister. This process will_ involve him in trouble all round.

The Machiavellian strategist who suggested asking tho Upper House to provide the machinery for making itself representative before the Lower House had had an opportunity of r aking itself representative is responsible for this awkward dilemma. There is a great likelihood, we should in agine, that an inexorable sons© of logic will make the House of Representatives demand that, if there is to be proportional representation, its first manifestation should take place in connection with ©lections to the Lower House. If the Prime Minister fails to concede that, his protestations of “democratic sentiment” will no longer avail. He will have been found out. If, under pressure, he is forced to the admission that the proper sphere of proportional representstion is the Ohamler into which representative men are sent to make laws, it will be extremely difficult for him to convince a sane community that it will bo necessary to have two elected bodies from the same constituency to do the. work which on© thoroughly representative body -could readily accomplish . Under the proportional method every class will receive adequate repre. senthtion in the House of Representatives, whenever the House of Representatives is elected under that system. To make tho Legislative Council representative while leaving the House of Representatives unrepresentative would be to endanger tho community’s reputation for political sanity. Already this Dominion is paying an enormous impost for the privilege of being governed. Its crying need is cheaper legislation and better laws. Hero comes along a Bhamreform Ministry which proposes to start on the wrong end of a contract for a duplication which will cost enormously more than the prevailing system, deliberately encourage . conflict, strife, and uproar, and, very probably, give the community no better result than it is getting under existing auspices.