"IN THE TWINKLING OF AN EYE."

Taranaki Herald, Volume LIV, Issue 13483, 24 July 1907, Page 7

"IN THE TWINKLING OF AN EYE."

THE GOVERNMENT'S SOMER- _ ... JSAJWiT.

The Dunedin Star is the Liberal Government's staunch friend, and rarely ventures to find fault with the Liberal Government's doings. But halving supported the Government's land policy of last year, the journal refuses to stultif v itself by imitating the somersault of this year. Instead it criticises the Governments contortion turn with much vigour. Thus : — »

The more closely the Ministerial surrender on the Land Question is regarded, the more extraordinary and incomprehensible does it appear. "We are going to stand by our guns, and will, it necessary, go down with them, and in the twinkling of an eye. We are not going to float about for half a century hanging to the Treasury benches whilst the people are not able to make out what our land policy is." So declared the Minister of Lands in his first flush of Ministerial enthusiasm nearly twelve months ago. A few weeks later, "in the twinkling of an eye," the guns were deserted, or at least withdrawn, with a solemn promise that the fight should be renewed in the following year. Disappointed reformers, while holding that a mistake had been made, accepted th« promise in good f aith-~and now 1 We have been looking through the reports of the chief speeches delivered by the Minister of Lands and the AttorneyGeneral during the recess, and we cannot conceive that any satisfactory explanation can be offered by Mr McNab and Dr. Findlay — we might add Mr Millar and Mr Fowlds — at the present juncture. Why, Mr Carroll, in his much-criticised and seemingly reactionary address a$ the beginning of the year, was very near the mark, after all. Mr McNab made no difficulty about announcing the Ministerial change of intention in respect to limitation and the graduated tax : why, then, did he give no hint of the coming capitulation in respect to the freehold and land sales and (in part) endowments? Knowing what we now know, it is difficult to acquit him of a serious breach of faith, especially in relation to the Land-Re-formers who were zealously supporting him in the belief that, this time at least, he would go down with the guns if necessary. When he spoke at Gore less than a month ago, and gave not the faintest hint of yielding, did he know what was coming? Or is it only since the Prime Minister's return that some sinister and paralysing influence has captured the Cabinet and persuaded them to throw consistency to the winds "in the twinkling of an eye"?