PROMPT PASSAGE

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 17945, 24 November 1932, Page 7

PROMPT PASSAGE

PUBLIC WORKS ESTIMATES STATEMENT NOT DEBATED (Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, this day. A record in recent Parliamentary history was set last night when the public works estimates, including the highways vote, a -total expenditure -of £8,620,700, was passed in three hours. The principal criticism centred around the Government’s decision to pay a retaining fee of £250 it year to Mr F. W. Furkort, formerly engineer-in-chief of the Public Works Department. On a division on this issue four Coalitionists voted with Labor, but the vote was passed by 30 votes to 25. 'The Opposition missed its opportunity to discuss the annual statement of tlie Minister of> Public Works, allowing a motion adopting it'to go through without a word being spoken. It is 'probably -the first time in the history of the New Zealand Parliament that the Opposition had nothing to say re* garding a highly-importnnt statement of Government policy. The day saw three now Government measures introduced. The -principal of these was the Municipal Corporations Consolidation Bill, which, among other things, carries the -principle- of longer tenures of office into effect as far as local bodies are concerned. Of the other measures, the Mortgagors and Tenants Further Relief: Bills is another instalment of what might bo 'termed emergency legislation occasioned by I lie present troublous times. The third bill provides for the incorporation of ' the Municipal Association and the regulation of its functions.