SIZE OF THE HOUSE

Southland Times, Issue 20203, 14 June 1927, Page 7

SIZE OF THE HOUSE

EIGHTY MEMBERS TOO MANY? COMMITTEE WORK IMPORTANT. Mr F. Waite, M.P., recently told a South Island audience that there were too many members in the House of Representatives, and that 40 should be the maximum. The Dominion, in dissenting from this view, states that the House consists of 80 members of whom four are Maori members and they sit only on one committee. It has 23 select committees appointed every session. Of these, one sits four days a week, and the majority of the others sit once a week regularly, but some of them, when they have an important bill or inquiry in hand, often sit day by day until it is finished. Of the remaining committees, most average about ten meetings in an ordinary session, and the balance three or four. In addition to these regular committees special committees are often appointed for special inquiries, such as licensing, motor bus regulations, etc. These committee proceedings naturally occupy a good deal of the time of members, and account largely for the strain which from time to time gives rise to complaint, but so long as members are averse to Tuesday meetings and present conditions remain unaltered, no real remedy can be applied. The subjoined table shows how the size of the House has been increased at. different times to accommodate the growth of population (European constituencies alone being referred to): —

sional work certainly might l>e made with advantage, the Dominion concludes. The forms procedure of Parliament could be improved on, and the work of the sessional committees better distributed.

Years. 1854 Members. .... 40 Population. 1858 .. .. .. 41 i 60,000 1860 .. .. .. 53 1862 .. .. .. 57 1865 .. .. .. 70 1867 .. 218,000 1870 74 1875 .. .. .. 84 300,000 1881 91 489,000 1887 .. .. .. 70 600,000 1900 .. .. .. 76 750,000 1927 .. .. .. 76 1,350,000 Some re-arrangement of the members’ ses-