NEW PROVINCES BILL.

Otago Witness, Issue 356, 25 September 1858, Page 7

NEW PROVINCES BILL.

Towards the close of the debate upon this Bill, Captain Cakgill made the following observations :—: —

He said he did not rise to oppose imy of the clauses of this Bill. He had opposed the Bill on its second reading as being in his view distaste, ful, and calculated to impede the progress of the Colony. But the House had ruled it otherwise, and to that decision he was bound to adhere ; nor should his adhesion be nominal only. He would be no gueiilla, nor do anything to vex what he had neither right nor power to arrest. But a new light had since been shed upon the subject by the only member present from Wellington — the Speaker of the House, and who had taken the first opportunity in Committee of stating the actual process in operation for colonising the Province of Wellington, by a definite and comprehensive scheme, and whioh strongly contrasted with the observations hazarded by the promoters of this Bill in the absence of the Wellington members, and especially of Dr. Featherston, the author and conductor of that scheme. In these circumstances, he (Capt. C.) would ask permission of the Committee to offer a few remarks of a somewhat general character. He thought there could be no greater delusion than to assert that Provincial Governments have any power to provide for the dispensation of justice or enforcement of law. Every Justice of the Peace and every law Court in the Colony was commissioned and maintained, as ought to be, by the Governor alone ; and let it be observed that even a Superintendent— that bsigbear of the ultra-centralist — was just as amenable as the humblest of the community. But to each Province was delegated the power and responsible duty of colonising its territory, so far as a careful and judicious application of its land fund should suffice, for piovidiug exploratory and accurate surveys— importing labour— laying out and executing road lines that should bring the district