POLITICAL NOTES

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 11294, 21 August 1922, Page 5

POLITICAL NOTES

PRESS GALLERY NEWS FINANCIAL DEBATE. XHE BUSINESS OF THE WEEK. The House of Representatives meets it 2.30 p.m. to-mofrow. The order of the day is the opening of tho debate on the Financial Statement ; and that debate will, in fact, constitute the busings of the week, taking precedence of all other matters. The Loader of the Opposition (Mr T. M. Wilford) will open the debate, and he will be followed by a Minister in reply. When suggesting that the debate should begin on Friday last, the Prime Minister said that there would be only these two speakers on the jpening night; but it is not certain whether that arrangement will apply, is the debate was postponed till tomorrow. It is anticipated that tho Budget debate will occupy the whole of this week, and possibly run well into next week, as the Financial Statement was both a length and an important one; and many members, it is understood, desire to have their say on it. SETTLED LAND BILL. STATUTES REVISION COMMITTEE'S' AMENDMENTS. The Settled Land Amendment Bill has been reported with amendments by the Statutes Revision Committee of the House of Representatives. The committee’s amendments include the deletion of the proposal that leaees-in-per-letuity may be authorised by the sourt, and also of the provision that the court may grant an extended lease on the ground that it is in the best interests of the beneficiaries. AGED AND INFIRM. THE PROTECTION BILL. The Aged and Infirm Persons’ Protection Amendment Bill, brought down by the Hon. J. G. Coates, provides, inter alia, that, save in exceptional oases, the Public Trustee shall be appointed manager of a protected estate; while all other managers of such estates are required to furnish to the Public Trustee statements showing the property in the estate, and Hie manasr in which it has been administered or adopted. Moneys in protected estates administered by the Publio Trustee are to bo paid into the common fund of the Public Trust Office. As manager of a protected estate, the Publio Trustee is given the same powsrs as if the protected person were a mental patient under the Mental Defectives Act.