The Timaru Herald. MONDAY, JUNE 17, 1907. A SUBDIVIDED BILL.

Timaru Herald, Volume XC, Issue 13314, 17 June 1907, Page 5

The Timaru Herald. MONDAY, JUNE 17, 1907. A SUBDIVIDED BILL.

We womkr whether tit:: public can. ov will, place any reliance in the stak-au'iil published with the authority of the Minister for Lands in regard to the intention:; of the Government respecting their notorious Land Bill. Personally w c . hsv-e given ap attaching any importance to whatever Mr McNab or hi* colleagues nuiy say on the subject. When Mr McNab signalised hi* accession to office last year by the almost instantaneous production '-oi n Bill which it was practically impoitihle for the most:'precocious legislative genius to hare properly considered in the time ai Ills disposal, he. had a lot of brave words to say about his "determination t'o stand or fall with his proposals. What actually happened is a matter of history. The Bill was dropped, bat Mr McNab remained Minister for Lands, and thy Government remained in office, discredited, it is true, bat stilt in possession of Cabinet rank. Bluing the recsssv Mr McNab ha* been preaching his Land Bill, with its limitation clauses, and its endowment clauses, from end to end of the colony. His colleagues, as everyone with a political east of mind is- well aware, have dont very little to help him. when they have not actually joined in the chorus of condemnation of his proposals. Almost thn la-t *hing Sir Joseph Ward did before he left ika colony for the Imperial Conference:, was to give an, assurance, that the Government was not tied to the-Bill, and later on. the Hon. J. Carroll, in an ungnarded ypeech which he subsequently made a halting attempt to explain away, went so far as to indicate its. probable abandonment. And now we have Mr McNab himself announcing the elimination of the very featuife? of the Bill to which, on its introduction, he attached the greatest importance. Is it any wonder that people have grown sick of the futile attempt *» find where the Government stand on the land question? In place of the original Bill, which a Ministerial journal proclaimed on its appearance as the most progressive piece of legislation laid before the colony for the last decade, we arc now promised no fewer than three separate measures—a Taxation Bill to effect by a heavy graduated land tax th* purpose at which Mr McNab aimed in his two limitation clauses, an Endowment Bill for placing the remnant (or some portion thereof not yet specified) of the Crown lands beyond the reach of the freeholder, and an amending Land Bill to reduce the duration of the lease* of Crown tenants. Mr McNab. we know, was a brilliant student in his day. and he now appears to be turning his university career to useful account by performing the mathematically impossible feat of trisectintr the angle—the '■ tight corner in which his Land Bill has placed him. Or perhaps he is acting upon the classic advice. " divide and rate-"—in other words, "chop up your Bills and keep in office." We have really no patience with this elusive Minister, and his lizard-like Bill which slips its taO as soon as an enemy lays firm hold of it. But nothing we could say could lie half so damaging to Mr McNab's poll . tical prestige as the contrast between what he said last September respecting his limitation proposals, and the cold-blooded way Sn which, he has now thrown fcliem to the jU-indX "K there is any danger at all." he said, "'about the general proposals of the Land Bill not being passed this session; I intend to ask the Ministers and the Hoosb to pass that aspect of our land policy and put it on the statute book before there is any mors cutting-up of land." And now we have seen the last of thos? limitation clauses, -and Mr McNab and his colleagues will no doubt say they substituted the graduated tax because Mr Ma&sey .preferred it. After all, weak Ministers with a big majority show a poor front to a strong opponent with a handful of followers.