THE Thames Advertiser. WEDNESDAY, NOV. 12, 1879.

Thames Advertiser, Volume XII, Issue 3469, 12 November 1879, Page 2

THE Thames Advertiser. WEDNESDAY, NOV. 12, 1879.

"We have before referred to the great, expectations which prevailed in the House of Representatives as to the startling revelations to be made fcy the Native Minister, as th,e mouthpiece of the present Government, on the faults of his predecessor. The whole country was on the qui vive, the mountain laboured and brought. forth a mouse, or, may-be, twins, or triplets, but, if the latter, they were small in proportion. Bearing this in mind, it was with quite a renewal of interest we found in a southern contemporary the statement" that now that an authoritatire report of the speech of Mr Bryce on Native Affairs had been issued it contained, as was to be expected, very much more than the telegraphic summary supplied intimated." What fell flat and dull on the House,—and, owing to expectations of highly-spiced scandal excited by those within it, flatter still on the country,—-is now to be revived, it is said, with additions. We have waded through the charges made, and, with the exception of some little matters too microscopic for the attention of any men with souls, cannot find anything more than Mr Sheehan gave p, crushing answer to in his reply. The hon. member for the Thames is charged with lamentable waste, and that the department over which he presided had actually been lending money to natives. This is mainly founded on the consent given to advance £2000 for the payment of the cost of erection of the runanga house at Parawai. A place built by a Government officer, appointed by a Government of which the present Treasurer was a member, and to whom thpre was found promised by Sir Donald McLean' one-half the money and the other half was secured on most valuable land, and realizable, if need were, at once. Then again it was stated that under the headship of Mr Sheehan the colony had been purchasing large areas of land 'at prices which it was not likely to obtain when the laud came to be resold. What is likely

or otherwise in this respect remains to be seen, but residents at the Thames who practically feel the evil results of the freehold of their town and country districts being still in the hands of native owners, are not particularly likely to blame with great severity a Minister who has done his utmost • with the limited means at his disposal to aid in acquiring the freehold for Europeans. Indeed the larger the freehold he gets transferred from native ownership and th&wn open for sale the better shall we believe he has served the colony. Another great point attempted to be made was on what was called the system of personal govern* ment. Mr Biyce asserted that under it the Native Minister had a practically irresponsible power to do a little work, and expend a great deal of money in the discharge of funotions belonging to all departments of Government. That whereas the European Government was in some degree classified and each Minister had his proper duties, in Native affairs the same Minister had to deal with every variety of business, and on all these he.was an autocrat. He had the care of Native schools, the granting of pensions, giving innumerrable gratuities, the control of*an enormous land-buying establishment, and the appraising and surveying of land. He assumed the power to suspend the action of the lj,w courts, and prevent the exercise of warrants. Indeed there was no; branch of business in which he did not assert and obtain the right to meddle, provided only the natives -were indirectly concerned in the matters in hand. Against this, system Mr Bryce raises a protest, and says, " I would deliberately set to work to destroy the principal part of the department, which I have so often called personal government j" and he would do this perfectly oblivious that the charges are self, contradictory, so far as the land question is concerned at least. He blames his predecessor for personal government and in the same breath complains of the want of it. Mr Sheehan forcibly replies that thehon. gentleman places himself on the horns of a dilemma. He understood him to assert that some native land bought tinder advice of a Mr Booth was not worth one-third of what was 'given for it. This gentleman was of the highest character, and the suspicion of an attempt to remove him from office formed the burden of Opposition complaints last session. Mr Sheehan instructed that official to buy at what he believed to be a fair price, and " was he to be blamed" for not personally going over every acre before completing—that would be personal government with a vengeance. He asserted that having appointed suitable officers +hey were bound to trust them." No doubt many mistakes have been made in the conduct of the Native Office, but in the matter of land purchase being too extensive those who know the evils resulting from the present system will be only too glad to see it carried much further, and the whole Jand— -native and European alike—placed under a common and equal system of taxation, for till this be done the grossest injustice will be inflicted and the hope deferred of the profitable settlement and cultivation of the country. , .