MR FISH'S ADDRESS.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 6503, 15 December 1882, Page 2

MR FISH'S ADDRESS.

Mr H. S. Fish, the representative of Dunedin South in the General Assembly, addressed the-electors in the Princess Theatre last even, ing. There was a good attendance, the stalls and dress-circla of the theatre being well filled. '

Mr J. B. Bradshaw, who occupied the chair, said, in the1 course of his opening remarks, that he hud no doubt from past experience that, since they had accepted him as chairman, they would support him Whilst he wag in it. The electors were not present to listen to him, but to Mr Fish. The member for Dunedin South had occupied many public positions—he had been for several years in the City Council, he had been on three or four occasions Mayor of the city, and had also served the public in the Provincial Council, before being elected to the Parliament of New Zealand. Mr Fish had done some good service during the session, as, for instance, by the vigorous and judicious manner in which he had successfully carried the Harbour Board Loan Bill. He (the Chairman) had referred to the public services rendered by Mr Fish, because he knew that the modesty of Mr Fish would prevent him blowing his own trumpet. Mr Fish, who was received with applause, said his two colleagues, who had already had the honour of addressing the electors, had both complained rather bitterly of the treatment they received at the bands of the local Press. He was not going to follow in their footstep! in that respect. Whilst he had often felt very severely the sting of Press criticism, and sometimes thought it was rather unfairly laid on, and rather thick, too—(laughter)—still he was free to confess that so far as the local Press was concerned he had no great fault to find. What, however, he did find fault with in connection with the Press was that the intelligence wired from Wellington to the citizens of Dunedin about their representatives, in nine cases out of ten, was.either a direct tissue of falsehoods or a gross misrepresentation of facts. Now how did this occur ? In his opinion this way: The papers here (he hoped they .would pardon him for being rude enough to pass an opinion) did not send their own officers to Wellington t« report the actions of the representatives. They employed persons connected with the Wellington papers, who tinged their reporters with their own political proclivities. If the Dunodin papers sent their own reporters, who were known to tho members, they would no doubt get a pretty correct representation of what was done. Under tho present system not oven a precis of what ■ was done was obtained, and he would advise the electors strongly to pay no attention to reports from "our own correspondent." They should wait till they got " Hansard." His colleagues had also been complimented on the general tone of their addresses. It had been stated in one paper that the one member had been very moderate, and the other studiously so. He was not there to be studiously moderate nor studiously rabid, but felt that he was in a position where the truth was demanded, and he was determined to tell it. He was returned 12 months ago absolutely as an independent member. He told the electors that he preferred taking up that position. It was a new Parliament, and he was a new member, and until he could see the inner workings of Parliament, until he could ascertain the. measures which the Government were bringing forward, he would not pledge himself to either one side or the other. Although he was returned as an independent member, he was free to confess that he went to Wellington with considerable Government proclivities, and ho felt that unles3 something in his opinion of serious import had occurred in connectionwiththeGoverumerit he should have been found, he thought, supporting them. He found it to be his duty to oppose the Government. He might say in passing that ho could not hope that evening to go exhaustively into all the subjects he would desire to touch upon, and would have to content himself with giving a flying survey of what occurred, reserving such matters as the land question, the financial policy of the Government, national insurance, local government, and secondary education for a' second and more exhaustive address. One of the first measures presented to Parliament was tho West Coast Peace Preservation Bill, which he supported. It had been stated by both his colleagues that tho passing of this was a great infringement of the liberty of the subject; that m point of faot the Government iv this instance rode rough-.shod over the Constitution. With the greatest respect to his colleagues, he considered that to be all bunkum.—(Mr Lloyd: "Hear.") —When men of a savage race were granted the rights of citizens, and chose to break the laws governing them they must expect to be treated as aliens and disturbers of the poace. It had been said by those who opposed to the action of the Government that whilst they agreed with the arrest of Te Whiti and Tohu, tliey took exception altogether to their being kept in durance vile without trial by jury. Theoretically and sentimentally this was correct, but there never was a rule without an exception, and if ever an exception applied it was in this case. If these men had been tillo.wed to return to Parihaka they would have excited dissensions, resulting probably in tho loss of human life. He thought that the action of the Government in this matter was thoroughly just and humane. He opposed the. Government because of their most vacillating character, their unnecessary and disgraceful delay in presenting their measures before Parliament, their public works policy, their scheme of national insurance, their loan bills,_ their groas injustice and favouritism to individuals, their railway administration, and because of several reasons which it was not necessary then to refer to. It would be remembered that in his election address one of the complaints he made with regard to the late Government, whose head.was Sir John Hall, was that their conduct was vacillating. They never seemed to have the courage of their convictions—to be able to put their foot down on the ground and say, "This is what we believe in, and if you do not, wo are quite willing that you should take the reins out of nur hands." The Government, minus Sir John Hall, continued vacillating at the time of the election of Chairman of Committees, a most important office, which should be occupied by a gentleman of firmness and moderation, having a thorough knowledge of the rules of the House, immense control, and suavity of manner. The Government proposed Mr W. J. Hurst," tho member' for Waitemata. It was found by them that he was not acceptable, or they did not think so ; and for over a week tho motion for the appointment was delayed. In Mr Hurst they had a pliant instrument, and whatever the Government told him to do it was apparent ho was willing to do; for although his name, was on the order paper for election, he allowed himself to be supplanted by Mr Hamlin. If the Government thought Mr Hurst was a proper man, they ought to have stuck to him. The fact of the matter was that they did notbelievo that he was the proper man, and only wanted to pay him on account of the celebrated ratting of the Auckland four. They were willing to foist upon the House n ■ gentleman simply to reward liim for political service of a very questionable character. In bringing .in tho Land Bill, the Government announced it as a non-party measuro, and very properly so. This bill provided for a system which he knew many thought the proper one for dealing with tho waste lands of the Crown, but ho was opposed to tho leasing of Crown lands. He never yet could see what good to the body politic could possibly arise From the leasing of the lauds. Even supposing

it ivere a good policy, it was too late to put it into operation. If they had commenced when the Colony was young—when very little bits of Crown lands had been alienated — there might have boen some force mit; but it was now too late, even though the principle was a good one, and ho was convinced that the principle had not thosa elements of success which many admirers seemed to think it had. Supposing the whole of the lands of the Crown | could be leased, there would be created an enormous class of Crown tenants, who would inevitably become an immense power in the State, and they would become so powerful that by organisation they could really rule the country; and they would be doing precisely the same thing as deferred-payment settlers had done—asking the House for remissions and assistance — and, by the force' of their' majority, would do almost as they liked. It was much better to limit the land one man could buy, and let him buy it outright. Nothftg made a man a good colonist and promoted a national feeling more than the possession ■ of a piece, of land, no matter how small in extent. It might be said that by selling the land the unearned increment was lost, but the land tax provided a remedy. 'The; land should bear a considerable amount of progressive taxation. This remarkable 'circumstance occurred in reference to this bill, and made him doubt Mr Rolleston's sincerity :— , When Sir John Hall made his speech at Leeston, one of the leading features of his programme was the non-leasing of the agricultural lands of the Crown. Sir John Hall was then declaring the policy of his Govßrnmqnt/and they might fairly assume that that policy had been discussed and considered by his colleagues in Cabinet; and if that were so, Mr Rolleston must have-been of opinion about six months before the meeting of Parliament that non-, leasing was the proper system, and' have changed his mind "in the interim. In his (Mr Fish's) opinion it was simply a sop to what he conceived to be popular" opinion, and he had no real intention of giving such effect to it as to make it useful to the body politic. A perusal of the bill as brought in by Mr Rollestou would shsw there were so many restrictions that there would not have been one out of 20 who could make his ground pay, or remain on it for one half the period of the lease. A great evil in the past had been the sales by auction of the land, and-Mr Rollestdn proposed to amend that pernicious system by one of tender, which was a;'great deal .worse, ' for if a man wanted a block of land he would be so frightened of losing it. that he would offer an extravagant price. He (Mr Piah); was in favour of; the ballot systemi- 'TteieyMa clause introduced into; the' bQlwHich;mefc,Triih his hearty support', although it .was run down by the Government papers as being aninterference with the liberty of the subjectarid the rights of capital. This was the M'Kerizie clause, and it was very gratifying to "find that" it was passed by so large a majority.;; If was said that they had no right to limit the amount of land a man might 'hold. He was-.not-pre-pared to argue the point, but he knew-if had been conceded that the people had a-right: to limit the occupation as they pleased. Anyone who took the: trouble to read through-the Financial Statement of Major Atkinson would ■find that there was a laboured attempt. all through to show that the "working classes were not taxed enough, and that the.wealthyjmid more than their just share ; and that the Colonial Treasurer meant that to be the case was evidenced by the fact, that whilst he put a heavy and vexatious tax upon such a commodity as beer he reduced the property tax to Jd in the pound. The next part of the Government programme was to put; forward the scheme which he had stated in the House indicated softening of the brain on theparfof the promoter. Nothing so iniquitous as-thiß scheme of national insurance of Major Atkinson could be imagined," especially ,- as applied to such a young -country;.as. this. It was a direct burden onv the poor, who, us a rule, having the most children, had to contribute the largest sums. On a future occasion he would touch upon this scheme and show it to be an utter fallacy from beginning to end. He would show the difficulty that would be experienced in collecting the tax on account of the migratory character of the population and the absolute inducements it afforded for malingering. Major Atkinson had evidently in his latter days taken to taking up the schemes of enthusiasts, and when-_a man indulged in the abstract theories he did it was time for him to retire. ■ Mr Fish then referred to the North Island and New Zealand. Loan Bills, which he had opposed, and in the course of his remarks on.thishead said that the present Government—led as it was by Major Atkinson—was tricky in the extreme. \ Ho opposed tho latter because it was unjust to the South ;.too little was to be spent upon railway. construction, and a great deal was allotted to. thoroughly unproductive works. He then pro- ■ ceeded to.give instances of the injustice and favouritism with which he charged Government, mentioning the manner in which Mr Mervyn, a settler at Roxburgh, had been treated, as well as the case of the Taranaki Iron-smelting Works Land Company. In referring to the want-of-confidence motion, he deplored "the weakness of human nature" which caused four members to leave the Opposition. The hon. members for Buller and' Greymoiith had turned out very slippery on account of the local wants they wished attended to ; and the adhesion of the member for Hawke's Bay had been obtained by the Government in consequence of 'the removal of a caveat against the member acquiring certain land ; while it was remarkable how quickly the Act to " whitewash". the member for Stanmore had been pushed through the House—how the . member was induced to turn to the "straight path." The manner in which the amount-set downfor the Lumsden-Mararoa line of railway came-to be struck off the schedule afforded an insight into the inner working of the' House. The sum of £35,000 was set down for it, and. at about half-past 1 or 2 o'clock iff the morning it was moved that this vote should be struck off. The House refused to do so by a majority of two, and shortly afterwards he (MrFishLbeing accustomed to reasonable hours, wenf home to bed, thinking that, so far as this particular line was concerned, all difficulty was over. To his intense surprise, however, he read in the newspaper next morning that a subsequent vote had bsen taken for the reduction to £34,000, and carried by a majority of 12. He learnt that, in order to allow some Southern members to have their district railways put on the schedule, a number of Government members had retired for a time. The Government, after winking at a thing like that, could hardly.be looked upon as lie plus ultra. The final appropriation at-the. end of the session showed thi.«. : There was £20,000 of the amount reinstated back to the Lumsden-Mararoa line, £5000 to ths Rivers-dale-Switzers, £5000 to the Kelso-Gore, and £5000 to the Seaward Bush. The members: who obtained these votes were naturally desirous to get what they could for their districts, and could hardly be blamed in the matter,-but the Government certainly were culpable. He had been told on the best authority that, neither of the three lines mentioned wan necessary, and that they had been reported against by the Government engineer. Each one started meant the commencement of an expenditure which would probably tot up to £100 or £150. That .was called good ■ government—the- doing of a Government they were asked to fall down and worship, and they were hounded down by the Press if they said one word in opposition to it, Those were facts, and their truth could be proved.—(Applause.) There had been a great deal of talk about sickness up at Wellington, which, it was stated, was caused by the bad ■ smells • in' the House, presumably emanating' from dead rats beneath the floors. He, however, had hazarded the suggestion—•which he'was then prepared to repeat—that the smells in1; tha House that were killing members, .'and poor reporters were-the result of the dooaying influence of broken promises proceeding, not from rats beneath the floor?, but from the human rodents with which: the House was infested. He now came to the discussion of a subject which wa3 of local concern, and in approaching this question\he desired to say that he had no wish to foment between employer and employed feelings which should not exist. Ths question -was that of railway employes and their grievances. He had been for the past 30 years to a greater or lesser extent an employer of labour. He knew working men well, and he knew that whilst there were good working men there' were also confoundedly bad ones, and he knew that if a dissatisfied man and agitator were placod amongst a lot of good men, lie would in ; all 'probability make a good many a.B bad1 as himself. Therefore he had no sympathy with men who agitated and wore dissatisfied, arid who, as was geuerally the case, were bad tradesmen. ■ Still he had considerable sympathy with any working man who had a grievance and could not get it redressed. They had heard a great deal about railway employes and the manner in which they had been din-* charged, and they had seen in the columns of the Daily Time 3 a good deal upon the subject, One gentleman had been stigmatised in very contumacious language as "thenian Dale." He was not much of a judge of gentlemanly conduct, because his education had not been of a very refilled, character, but he should say such lari-. guage was hardly such as a gentleman should use to anyone, no matter how humble. Dale had been pointed out as an evil example, and a warning to all and sundry workmen. The first notice lie got of dismissal was to this effect:—" I have been instructed by the General Manager to inform you that you are not good enough foe the service. You are to receive a"fortnights, pay in lieu of notice, and your money will be ready' for you at" the statiqnmaster s office, Dunedin, after you have completed this day'a work.—A. Bmokmobe, locomqr tive foreman." Mr Dale" wrote in reply a very respectful letter,' expressing surprise at his dismissal, stating that he h,ad beerj 18 years in the service of. the Prpvjucial and General Governments, 10 of-winch he had been in the position from which lib was so summarily- dismisseel, asking that an inquiry should •> be instituted, and pledging himself that if any charge could be substantiated against him by an im : partinl board he-would never . say another word —(Applause.) Tho reply received was of a similar character to the first letter, and Mr Dale had to leave. Although the Govern; men had the power and right to do . what they had done, was it fair to exercise a right of that kind in connection with a man who had been so long in the sei'V ; C6 j—(A Voicei: No). If this man was unfit for the service, incapable, arid unfit to do hid work, what must have been the character of his superiors to have allowed him to remain in the responsible position of ongiiro-driver for 10 years, and only then to find it out —(Applause, and a cry of " favouritism.") He had no doubt that this man was punished because lio had tho temerity to exercise the right of a Briton — freedom of speech, -r (A Voice : l" Good shot.") He was punished and was sen t about his business because lie had tho temerity to say eolnething not pleasant to bis superior officers in the Railway Department.—(Aj>-

clause.) To give another case, there were three men dismissed named Stewart, Ames, and Minn. ■ A Voice : What has that got to do with tho city, sir? Sir Fish : Everything to do with tho city. A Voice: "Shut up."—(Hear, and applause.) Mr Fish said that the management of our railways, and the conduct observed by the Government officers to the railway employesmen who had the lives of citizens, follow creatures in their hands every day, was a matter of great importance to the city—(applause)—and to the whole of the Colony.— (Hear.) If a wrong was done it should be righted, no matter whose corns were trampled on in tho righting of it.—(Hear, and applause.) No reason was given for tho discharge.—(A Voice :." How is it?") lie would tell how it was. They belonged to a society ; and by some means or other certain resolutions (the blackguard who gavo them publicity should be shot for doing so) came surreptitiously and improperly into the hands of the head of the Railway Department. They wore dismissed, and the man Stewart, one of the best men in the service—sober, intelligent, discreet, honest, and thoroughly respectablewas dismissed without ono word against him. These men were, however, taken back, and if they were rightly dismissed were improperly taken back. They apologised, perhaps, but what was the nature of an apology when it was abstracted at the point of a dagger? What was the value of the confession of the poor wretch who was stretched upon tho Inquisition rack ? Seeing their bread and butter depended upon the fact whether they gave an ample apology or not, it was not surprising that they ate the leek and gave the apology, although they knew it was improper, in- order to secure their children from possible want. —(Appiause.) He saw a statement in the Otago Daily Times which he noticed with great regret. It was-a threat that the railway employes would be disfranchised. They could afford to laugh to scorn such a despicable threat, for there was not a member of Parliament who would dare to bring such a proposal forward as that hinted at by the Daily Timed. He believed that where there had been so much grumbling there must have been some cause for it. Mr Maxwell, he was of opinion, was an excellent engineer, but was thoroughly unfit to manage men, and he thought the Government should seriously consider whether Mr Maxwell should not. be confined.to attending to the engineering part of the railway system, and Mr Hannay, a man,who was better able to deal with a staff of-employes, appointed to look after the working department of the railways. Another question which called for serious consideration waa the absolute necessity for all inquiries, into railway accidents being held in public, and conducted by men unconnected with- : the department. It was not to be ex-pecte'cl-that persons connected with the service would be very particular to elicit facts that might reflect upon their own judgment. He had heard —though the statement might not be correct—that the wheels of the engine that went off the line recently.at Blueskin were Of a particular make, some experiments being-tried, upon them by Mr Alison Smith. He did not say that these experiment! had cansed the accident, but they might have done so; while the fact that there was only a boy acting as fireman on the engine, he thought, showed anything but good management. Last session the Government had been extremely glib over the fact that they showed a profit of £308,000 a year upon the working expenses of the railways, but the profit had been made at the expense of the efficiency of the rollingstock; which had been allowed, to depreciate to such an extent that its renovation would cost hundreds of thousands of pounds. To the local government proposals he would refer at greater length another time. The one thing in these proposals which stood out conspicuously was " centralism." By the Rating Act a paternal Government took charge of the bor-oughß, made their valuations for them, and did everything in Wellington. By tho Roads and Bridges Construction Act a Ministry might do this or the other, the evident object throughout being to make boroughs lose their independence and self-reliance—which was the life of men and of constituencies—and to cause them to rely for everything upon assistance from Wellington. The last-named Act would bring upon the floor of the House every year rights interminable as to whether certain works should be undertaken out of the £1,000,000 the Government proposed to take out of the Land Fund. » He, a Dunedin member, would be asked to vote upon the propriety of a road being constructed at Lake Wakatipu, or on the desirability of a road at the northern extremity of the Colony. What could he knew of these things? It really came to this: that it would depend upon the willingness of the Government whether a district would get the road it wanted or not, and the measure, instead of giving tho boroughs local self-government and making them really self-reliant, would corrupt their members and cause them to give aid to the Government in order to get their favour and support for local works; He would be told that it was the House that would pass the works; but anyone who knew anything of Parliament knew that the party in power had a ruling voice in these matters, and could command support on condition that such votes were allowed to go through smoothly. The bill was nothing less than an aid to bribery and corruption, and they would find that any Ministry, or at least most Ministries, would use this wretched Act in order to keep their seats. There could be no doubt the measure had been misnamed; it should have been called ," The Roads and Bridge Corrupt Purchase of Votes Act." Never had he met with a better illustration of asking for bread and receiving a stone than was here furnished. The country had wanted self-government-local, self-reliant', and permanent, and had got this miserable bill, which was the hardest and ugliest of all the ugly and hard stones he had ever seen in his life. There was still another noticeable thing in connection with these bills. To the everlasting disgrace of the Government, it must -be said that after similar bills had been rejected oh three occasions, the Government brought them in at the end of the session, when, he was sure, nine-tenths of the members were so much fogged out, so prostrated by the hard work of the session, that they had not tho physical power to read the Acts through. Was this proper or wise? The Government urged in extenuation that the bills had been before previous Parliaments, but instead-pf that being an excuse it only supplied ah additional reason why the measures should have been laid before Parliament at an earlier- period. If previous Parliaments had rejected them, the clear inference was that there was something bad in them, and the amplest opportunity should have been given for their consideration. He did not intend to propound a policy for the future, but must admit; that he was powerfully conscious of the-, unsatisfactory state of local government at the present time, and would give any proposal on this subject his earnest consideration. —(Applause.) The Government had appointed aa the new Minister a man eminently respectable, and, in 'his'own profession, no doubt, ordinarily clever, but he took leave to express the opinion that Mr Conolly was somewhat of a fossil. .He did not think ho would be wrong in saying that there was no probability of the new Minister ever setting the Thames on fire, but that he (Mr Conolly) was one of the politicians who believed in the "rest "and be thankful" policy. His (the speaker's) idea, however, was that in a Colony like this there was no room for stopping, there must always be progress. Nor could he help expressing the idea that Canterbury had been treated badly by the Government. It had been understood in the lobbies, at any rate, that Mr Wright was to be the Minister of Public, Work s-, and though Mr Wright had come into c nflict with him upon the Harbour Boardßil], he must say that Mr Wright wa3 well qualified for the position, and that the country had lost by his non-appointment far more than it was likely to gain from the position being filled by its present occupant. He could, however, understand the action of the Government. The fact was that there were only two men in the present Ministry—Mr Whitaker and Major Atkinson; they were the leading spirits, barring Mr Bryce, who took no action in anything but Native affairs. Mr Whitaker and Major Atkinson did not want a rival; they did not want a man who " wanted to know, you know," and the appointment called to his mind certain questions that Mr Wright had put on the order-paper with reference to certaiu expenditure in Taranaki. He did not think it was a matter of much consequence, but if a proposal was made to vary the Constitu- . tion so as :o provide for the election of our Governors it would have his support.—(Applause.) That they could do without a nominated Qovernor was proved by the fact that Sir Arthur Gordon had spent only about half I|i3 time in this Colony, while no one could say that the Chief . Justice had not administered the affairs of the Colony equally as well as a nominated Qovernor would have done. The election of the Governor might be sent to her Hajesty for confirmation, and the union with the Mother Country, which some seemed to dread the alteration would sever, thus maintained. . By-and-bye the children born here would grow up and fill the public positions, and what greater incentive to duty conld a future statesman have than the right or possibility of some day occupying the position of Governor of his: native' land ?—(Applause.) .He was in favour of the reform of the Upper House, and expressed the opinion that all who knew the composition of the House would be of opinion that a change of some kind was necessary. He considered that the House should be composed partly of nominated and partly of elected members. He was in favour of payment of members. In every country having liberal institutions the object should be to get the constituencies well represented, and if the people were to be properly represented they must make it possible for members in their own rank of life to live decently. ' The •'honorarium" was rubbish. Why did not they call things by their right names? He would have every member paid £300 per annum; the " honorarium" provided for the payment to them vf 200 guineas. Some said that the payment of members would lower the status of the House; but how many times they found brains allied to poverty, and utter vacuity allied with wealth. The mere possession of wealth did not indicate either honesty or intelligence, and the peasant-born man might be as good as the man born in the purple. For those vyho thought the payment of membora degrading there was a simple remedy—they need not take the payment; but ho had never found any of the superfine gentlemen who exclaimed against the degradation of the payment of members refuse the honorarium, and in only twoinstances had members over given their honorariums to eh aritable institutions. Of the motion brought forward by Mr Shrimieki proposing that land through which new lines ran should be liable to bo

taxed if the railway failed to pay a certain per centage on its cost, he entirely approved. This principle was part of Sir Julius Vogol'a scheme, ■ but it had unfortunately been log-rolled out of the House. Its revival, aa proposed by Mr Shrimski, had boon burked by the Hon. Major Atkinson.' At tho time he (Mr Fish) told Major Atkinson that another resolution brought forward on the subject, and supported by him (Major Atkinson), was a sham, and that the question would not come up again ; and though tho Loan Bill passed, nothing more was heard about rating the hinds through which unprofitable linos wove constructed. Mr Fyke's Education Bill was denominatiunsltsni pure and simple, and he had voted against it, as he had said ho should do. Ho was opposed to any denominational system of education being subsidised by tho State, as ho felt that would bo utterly destructive of our present noble system. He had, howoyer, said, and would say again, that if the advocates of Bible-reading in schools should be successful, be would be inclined to give Koman Catholics the relief they claimed, because he considered a just canso of complaint, which they had not now, would be given them. He wished to say a few words with regard to secondary education, though he would on a subsequent occasion deal more fully with this question. He held that the system of secondary education here was wrong in principle. If he admitted — which he did not—that secondary education was necessary as a State system, then at any rate the two systems should not overlap each other; boys should learn all they could in the primary schools, and then continue their education at the High School. The result of lh* present system was that a boy who had passed tho Sixth Standard in tho primary schools, and then went to the High School, was pnt back in his studies, because the High School did not succeed the primary schools, and the lad would naturally be discouraged and disgusted. If a boy was not to be thus put back on going to the High School he must be sent to that school when very young, and the result of this overlapping of the systems was a considerable loss in money per annum. The time was coming when the interests of the country would compel the State, if it was necessary for the State to carry on secondary education at all, to make that education entirely self-supporting. He had told them before that the State had no right to educate beyond the common schtols. — (Applause.) The 10 Grammar and High Schools in the Colony received in fees £16,638 93 Gd, while it cost them to teach the boys and girlsattendingthem£S2,2sl4s7d. Therewereon the rolls of the schools 1587 pupils, the average attendance being 1456. Of these 70 were under the age of 10, and 924 between 10 and 15, so that they might assume that at least 400 did not exceed the age of 12. He mentioned this to show that four or five' hundred boys were being taught at a cost of £13 per head who ought really to be taught in the elementary schools, at a cost of £4 10s per head. Prom 15 to 18 years of age—the ago at which pupils should go to the High School —there were 449 scholars, and over 18 years 24. They were not, he said, jnstified as a Colony in paying £15 per head for teaching children the majority of the parents of whom were well able to" pay for the education themselves. But the greatest evil in the system was that boys and girls were taken to the High School when very young, and this encouraged people to send them there, simply because they preferred that their children should not! rub noses with the dirty little boys and girls of the common schools. He did not at all object to people having that idea, only he thought if they wanted a luxury of the kind for their children they should not have it out of his pocket. He could assure them the question was a serious one, and would crop up in the Legislature, for they had to pay £16,000 a year for teaching these boys and girls, and last session £4000 per year had been granted to the Auckland College in peipetuity. It was a grand thing to educate their children to a high standard of excellence, but they might pay too much for their whistle. He had less objection to universities than to the High Schools, and thought the higher education of those who showed particular aptitude in the prosecution of their studies in the primary schools should be encouraged by a system of scholarships. It was'a matter of regret to him that the Eight-hours Bill had not passed in the form it was brought forward. If its promoter had been more accustomed to political life he would have passed the bill through or have had it rejected- altogether, because the skelet-n that was passed was simply a mockery. Mr Green had remarked that the Harbour Board Bill was nearly talked to death ; but he (Mr Fish) would sooner have had it entirely talked to death than suffered it to be emasculated as the Eight-hours Bill had been. For his part he believed he had piloted the Harbour Board Bill through with considerable skill and diplomacy, and had certainly never worked harder or exercised more self-restraint than in connection with that measure. —(Applause). As showing the amount of work a member was compelled to do, he mentioned that he had received and replied to 150 telegrams and over 300 letters. He desired to take the opportu"nity of referring to the presence in Dunedin of a gentleman who had been one of the ablest poli-. ticiansof New Zealand. Hereferred to Sir Julius Vocel.—(Applause). That gentleman, politically, was no doubt well known to them all. He believed that Sir Julius Vogel had, by his vigorous policy and his judicious conduct, pushed the Colony ahead fully 50 years; and more than that, when at -Home as Agentgeneral, and afterwards, the manner in which he had championed the cause of New Zealand had had considerable influence in bringing the Colony before eminent men at Home. He sincerely hoped that Sir Julius Vogel would not be allowed to leave without some suitable recognition being made of his public and private worth. In conclusion, he had to say that he had abbreviated his story in many parts, but had tried to be as clear as possible, and t» give a faithful account of his stewardship. When a candidate, he had undertaken, if elected, to fulfil the duties to the best of his ability ; as a member, he had endeavoured to do so, and now he awaited their verdict. Two unimportant questions were asked, after which Mr H. Guthrie moved a vote of confidence in Mr Fish, expressing the opinion that he had honestly and faithfully fulfilled his duties, and had well served the interests, not only of the city of Dunedin, but of the Colony generally. Mr Pagan seconded the motion, which was carried unanimously.

Mr Fish, in acknowledging the vote, said that he had endeavoured to merit their confidence, and that having done so he had felt sure of kind and generous recognition at their hands. He was utterly fearless of everyone. He wished to be rude and offensive to none, but was determined so long a.< he had a tongue to use it to the best of his judgment, careless whether he offended or pleased-cliques or coteries so long as he did fisiit, for he knew that when he appealed to them, they would approve of his conduct. The meeting then concluded.