POLITICAL GOSSIP IN WELLINGTON.

Taranaki Herald, Volume XL, Issue 9190, 18 September 1891, Page 2

POLITICAL GOSSIP IN WELLINGTON.

PAYMENT OF MEMBERS BILL. THROWN OUT. Friday, September. 18—The Colonial Secretary moved last evening that the Payment of Members Bill be reinstated on the Order Paper, when an amendment " that it be laid aside " was carried by a majority of thirteen. There was no debate, and the wholo affair was settled in a few minutes. BUSINESS BEING PUSHED ON. In the Lower House the business is being pushed through. The members sat till four this morning, and a large portion of tho estimates were agreed to. PARLIAMENTARY HONORARIUM. Mr Rees, as a lawyer, was asked his opinion the other day regarding a curious point of law. Some members held that for a second session in nny one year the full honorarium of £100 and £50 expenses could not bo drawn, tho legal payment for a second session being only £100, or £50 as honorarium and £50 as expenses Mr Rees stated that his reading of the Act was that the sum of £150 could be claimed for every session, even if there were five sessions in one year. He and Mr Palmer, who agroed in tkis viow, wroto this opinion and sent it to the Speaker, who, to their surprise, read it to the House to-day, and read also an opinion of his own dissenting from the viow expressed by Messrs Rees and Palmer. Mr Buckland considered that the opinion which the latter gentlemen had expressed would not be upheld by any 'judge in the world. Mr Rolleston said ; the country would think that they had had enough of the honorarium question in tho Housa this yei*r. Eventually the question was referred to the Government, so that they may take the opinion of the law officers of the Crown on the legal question involved. MR SMITH ADVOCATES MORE WASTE OF MONEY, Mr E. M. Smith wants the Government to reprint copies of all public documents that it is possible so to do that were burnt by the fire at the old Government Printing Office. LAND BILL TO BE DROPPED. The Minister for Lands recognises that it is impossible that any compromise can be arrived at between the two Houses on the Land bill, and intends to drop tho Bill, throwing on the Council the onus of pi eventing the land beiag thrown opon for settlement throughout the colony. He threatens to stump New Zealand from the North Cape to the Bluff during the recess, and make the countiy ring with hie denunciation of! the conduct of the Uppor House