GENERAL A MBLY.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 1168, 29 September 1865, Page 6

GENERAL A MBLY.

THE SEPARATION QUESTION.

(From the Canterbury Prnsß.^porUr.j -'"■

AD JO ÜBS ED DEBATE ON ME SUSSEU/s

..MOTION

The COLONIAL TREASURER (hon. Mr Fitzherbert) said, the question brought before the House by the hop, member for Auckland (City) East, the,' late Minister for Defence, Mr Russell, tfas one of larger, dimensions and greater'importance than any ih it had hitherto been proposed to "the New Zealand Legislature. Accordingly, the House expected that the hon. member would have supported such a motion by cogent arguments, and close reasoning, that he would have rfaen above the ordinary low level of party spirit, and soared into the higher and wider regions of colonial statesmanship. But if such hopes were entertained, they were doomed to disappointment. Without venturing to inquire whether the honorable member thought, by the course he wa3 pursuing, to secure a party triumph, or whether he was merely laboring underpressure of a dearth of argument wherewith to support his proposals—certaia it was, that whereas the hon. member adduced only a few weak reasons in favor of his motion, he travelled over the entire range of parliamentary discussion, and seized with avidity on every topic which appeared likely to furnish support to a party attack on the present Ministry. Stil he (the Colonial i'reaurer), should not have deemed it necessary to follow the hon. member through his wanderings, had he not thought proper to make an attack on the financial administration of the present Government. As, however, the hon. member had chosen to do so in direct and explicit terms, and as it was known that he was not only a leading member of the late Government, but also a Director of the Bank of New Zealand—through which establishment the Government business had been conducted —he thought the Hou?e would expect him, as Treasurer of the Colony, to meet the charges. His principal object therefore in rising to address, the House, was to accept the challenge which had thus been thrown down by the late Minister for Defence, rather than to discuss the merits of the important question rained by the motion before the House. He confessed that it was with extreme reluctance that he came forward on this occasion, but the taunt that his hon. friend at the head of the Government would not have dared to face the late hon. member for Rangitikei, coupled with the unprovoked and unjustifiable attack of the late Minister for Defence on the financial administration of the present Government, had unsealed his lir>s, and in order that the conduct of Government might not be misrepresented, and to give the House an opportunity of fully understanding the relative positions of the late and the present Government as to the financial exigencies of the colony in November, 18G4 (when the change of Government occurred), it became imperative on him to refer to interviews which would otherwise have remained unrecorded. He must ask hon. members to refresh their memories as to the circumstances under which the House met last session. .It■ will be recollected that oh that occasion their predecessors did not yield to the present Government in consequence of any adrerse actions on their part, for the country was virtually without a Ministry when the Ilouee met. Having been thus called upon without the slighest sign or motion on their part to accept the responsibility of the Government, they discovered within a few days of taking office that (he financial condiion of the colony was truly alarming. Indeed, bad he (the Colonial Treasurer),been aware of the real state of the finances, he would never have undertaken such a task. If for no other reason, he should have declined it, from diffidence of his power to grapple with such a at"te of things. And. he must say that when bis .Excellency asked Ministers in September last to furnish him with a statement, of the finnn-ial condition, of the colony, the}'were greatly to blame as be (the Colonial Treasurer) thought, for fencing with the question in the way they did. Now, in the opinion of his colleagues, it was indispensably for the success of their policy that the session should not be a protracted one. But if the combustible material? contained in the famous memorandum, were once ignited, all hope of bringing the, seasion to a speedy close must have been abandoned. Under those circumstances, he (the Colonial Treasurer) sought an interview with the late hon. member for Rangitikei in the presence of th> ir mutual friend, the hon. member for Wellington (Dr Featherston), and frankly explained his views of the state of fiuancial embarrassment in which the late Government had left the colony; and appealed to him, not without success at last, not to add to those .embarrassments which the present Government had to take over from their predecessors, by opening up questions which would protract,the session. Accordingly, the late member for Rangitikei declined tbe : temptation of displaying his oratorical powers ; and the members of the ! present Government not only refrained [ from throwing stones, but when the hon. ' member for Wallace and the hon. member for Elleemere desired last session to move for ; a Gommittee to. enquire into the financial condition of the country, the Colonial Treasurer intimated that he should regard the motion in a technical sense—and the motion was not pressed. And although his hon. friend at the head of the Government had, on that occasion, declared that he would not oppose any such motion, if made the next session; and although his Excellency was not advised to attach his signature to a certain covering warrant for the expenditure of the months of July, August, -September, October, and November, 1864, pending any action, that might be,taken by the House—yet the Government, , had npt initiated any motion ia the, House in reference thereto, and he could appeal to his hon. friend the Chairman of the Audit. Committee, that they had;; not , any intention of doing so up to the. very, moment that the hon. member, the late Minister for. Defence, rose, to make his attack ori the financial conduct of the Government. Almost all the members of the late Government bad ceased to be members of the House, and the present Government bad hitherto carefully refrained from commencing- an attack- upon them in their absence., However, the hon. member's ■ conduct njjjd entirely removed any, scruples.on that score j and

his colleagues now fairly challenged him to substantiate his charges. But, before enquiring into the particulars of those charges, he tnu^t,be .allowed -to congratulate'the hotnV. yeniber fdlir* having profited by his - extensive- professional experience in .the Jaw courts 5; wh|re lie had no doubt occasionally watched with : some.interestvcases; where the 'ireaF culprit appeared in the capacity of a much r injured prosecutor. He (the Colonial Treasurer) believed he should virtually succeed in placing the hoa-member in hi 3 proper position -before the .-House; but in '< the meantime he had certainly endeavored, with consummate assurance, to turn the tables on the Government. He would take the charge.1? seriatim, as they appeared in the notes he had taken at the time, which'tallied pretty, well with the report of the hon. member's speech, as it was published in the newspaper. The hon. member charged the Government with ;" not having continued the cutting down of the expenditure, commenced.by the late Government; that if it had been carried out' the colony would have been in a better state than ever."- [Mrßussell here interrupted the bon. member, and said tbat he did not use the word " ever" but "now."] " And he protested against the unauthorised expenditure with regard- to the Wanganui campaign." The Colonial Treasurer expressed his surprise that the hon. member should level such charges against the present Government, charges which he felt would either recoil upon that hon gentleman's own head, or drive the present Government from office. He could not but express his surprise and chagrin when his hon. frund charged the present Government with having been extravagant in the expenditure of the Three Million Loan. He confessed tliat if the charge had been mnde by any other hon. member, he (the Colonial Treasurer) should not have made any complaint. He should simply have contented himself with rebutting and disproving the charge. But after all the forbearance shown by the present Government towards their predecessors (as already fully explained), at a time when the transactions were recent and the House eager to enquire into their conduct; when his hon. friend permitted himself to make such a charge, he did certainly ap preciate alike the gratitude and audacity of the act. His hon. friend appeared entirely to have forgotten that he was a member of that Government, which, by means of a series of bills drawn to the extent of no less a sum than L 823,000 by the members of h«s Government (iv which somehow or other they certainly did manage to permit the name of their colleague, Mr Fox, to appear pretty frequently) on the London branch oi" the Bank of New Zealand, of which institution he was a Director—contrived to discount and anticipate funds which had no actual existence at the time. And although young men in the colonies did sometimes resort to Buch practices, and draw on the cool stream which is said to be ever flowing at Aldgate, yet the instances on record were, he believed, extremely rare in which, with such transactions fresh before them, they proceeded to read a lecture on economy to their dupes. He appeared abo to have forgotton that he was a member of that Government' which, by forcing the sale of the first million' of debentures, in order to cover those drafts, contrived at one and the same time, to save the bank of which he was director, and sacrifice the colony to the extent'of not ranch less than Ll96;GgO. And again he (the Col. Treasurer would'ask how it could be that the present Government would have placed the colony in a better position now if they had followed the economising example set them by their predecessors, when by a reference to the Bank account, it would be found that, on 15th November last (just before the hon. member left office), the overdrawn ■account amounted to no less a sum than L 829.666 10s 3d; and tbat, at the latest advices received from Auckland, viz, 22ud August last, the overdrawn amount had been reduced to L 30,161 15.3 7d. (Hear, hear.) Another fact which could not be denied wa% that the extravagant expenditure which the : hon. member says ought to have been cut down according to the eximple of retrenchment set the Government by their predecessors, has not oDly been incurred mainly within the Province of Auckland, but h being so incurred on account of liabilities deliberately fastened on the Colony by the'hon. member himself. That'the expenditure which the member complains of has reached £75.000 a month, instead of being reduced to £40,000, has been principally incurred within the Province of Auckland, is proved by the following figures, which are the ommnts of the monthly; estimates of the Auckland Sub-Treasurer, viz :—

1864 £ s. d. March ' ' .. 50.610 6 8 ■ 'April.-. ... 52,129 14 10 May ... 51,875 10 10 June .. : 35;560 16 9 July . 49.554 4, 2 August ... . 40,930 5 9 September ... 41,635 910 . The hon. member, therefore, intends the Hou3e to conclude that he disapproves of the lavish expenditure which the pre-. sent Government has made amongst hid constituents; and that he differs from his other colleagues'and the public press of the province, who unite ia condemning the present Government lor abstracting the revenues of Auckland and expending them elsewhere. And the hon. member further, it would seem, does not hesitate to ask the House to forget the assertion hazarded by him in a former part of his speech, viz.—that the present Government had .. shamelessly broken faith by refusing to allow certain; expenditure within the, Province of Auckland. His hon. friend hid,', protested against the unauthorised expenditure of the Wanganui campaign;- No doubt, last session, the precise amount of expenditure for that service was not included in any, Appropriation Act, and for the very simple i reason that tlje House agrejd that it would : not proceed to pass appropriations until after the end of the financial period, which , had yet seven months unexpired to run. But the undertaking itself; ia respept of, which the hon. member complains that the expenditure':.was unauthorised, was, pro-, minently . ; noticed in. the , . Ministerial,, speeches, formed a main feature of tnej policy ol the present Government, and did, moreover, receive the sanction of the House, rlt was not only unfair, .therefore, to cocaplaid of the financial conduct .of the Government on this point, bat it was substantially ■ \neorrect to assert that the exr pendituret was, unauthorised. : ■ ", :■*•: i '■■ (To. hs continued.}

DwutdiK Wool Stores, Hot: i, 1864.

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