MEMBERS’ SALARIES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20870, 9 November 1929, Page 12

MEMBERS’ SALARIES.

The claim that the remuneration received by members of Parliament in New Zealand is lower than is warranted by the importance of the positions they occupy and the demands that are made upon their time in the service of. the country is one : that we have not been disposed to regard as invalid. the salaries that are paid to members of Parliament in Australia are not excessive, those paid in New Zealand are most inadequate. It would probably be a sound conclusion that, when all their perquisites are taken into account, the members in Australia are It is, however, difficult to contend that, if the legislators in the Dominion are not to be drawn from a class that is favourably situated in respect of finance, the salary of £450 which has been paid ' to members of the Lower House ■ since the amount was temporarily reduced some years ago is sufficiently large. Not only is it desirable that the salary should be one that will admit of the composition of the House being as widely representative as possible, but also that it should be such as will preserve members from any temptation to sacrifice their integrity. While the case for increasing the salaries of , members is unquestionably strong, it is difficult to admire the method by which their emoluments for the current year are being increased. The device which the Government has employed of including in the Appropriation Bill, introduced on the last day but one in the session, without previous notice, a -Clause providing for the payment to members of an additional sum this year of £IOO, is one that is suggestive of a certain sense of shame on the part of its authors. The payment seems unnecessarily liberal if it is based on the duration of a session, which was not unusually long and for which Parliament has little to show as the result of its labours. In any event, however, it should not have been authorised in the half-clandestine manner that was adopted. When the salaries of members were augmented a good many years ago by the* passage of a vote on the Estimates, granting them an extra sum of £4O each, the transaction was widely described as a “ £4O steal.” The procedure which has been followed this year may not be similarly stigmatised, but it will be regarded with distinct disfavour by a great many people who arc prepared to admit that the salaries of members are lower than they should be as well as by those —a large section of the community—who may hold that the legislators should not help themselves to increased emoluments at a time when they have pleaded the state of the finances of the Dominion as a reason why the salaries of public servants should not be advanced.