THE AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE.

Taranaki Daily News, 13 September 1926, Page 6

THE AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE.

The surprise expressed by the Minister of Agriculture (Hon. 0. J. Hawken) at the tone of the debate in the House of Representatives last week in regard to the Bill for the establishment of an Agricultural College is not to be compared with the surprise •with which the country will view the unsatisfactory position whigh the matter has been allowed to reach. Mr. Hawken said emphatically that looking at the needs of the whole Dominion it was essential that the college should be situated in the North Island, and that the site chosen at Palmerston North had been selected as most nearly fitting in with the recommendations of expert investigators. At first the Prime Minister supported his lieutenant and, very properly, rebuked the parochialism of those Canterbury members who sought to make Lincoln College the agricultural college for the Dominion. On the last night of the session, and without any argument or reason, other than that possibly of parly expediency having been adduced fo» his action, Mr. Coates talked compromise, and permitted one of the most important of the Government’s policy measures to be passed with an undertaking, that it will be used in a very restricted manner only. The Bill establishing the college has been passed, b'ut the Government has given an undertaking that it will merely purchase the site at Palmerston North, establish thereon a glorified dairy school, and hold the full project up for review during the jecess. In the light of the Prime own speeches on the urgent need for affording our primary producers ail the help that science can give them, if they are to meet successfully the ever increasing competition for markets, his spineless surrender - to organised obstruction is as amazing as it is regrettable. In a conflict between local desires and Dominion needs the Prime Minister has allowed the former to win. That is not leadership, it is political bargaining.