“STONEWALLS.”

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXIV, Issue 18845, 7 April 1931, Page 7

“STONEWALLS.”

INCIDENTS OF PAST STRUGGLES. HOW TIME IS TAKEN UP. INTERESTING STRATEGY. (Written for “The Evening Post” by F.W.W.) The resources of the stonewaller are many and various. The present writer has witnessed every stonewall of the last 45 years in the New Zealand Parliament, and can recollect many amusing incidents. Primarily, the justification of a stonewall is the holding up of a legislative proposal in the hope of gaining some concession from the Government of the day, either through negotiation or as the result of pressure exerted from the electorates. It cannot be said that the main arguments to that end are those offered in the open discussion. Often these are either frivolous or harmless. Sometimes they are merely the means of marking time while the overtures are conducted outside the chamber by the leaders of the obstructing party. When the concessions aimed at, or some compromise upon them, are achieved, the blockade ceases, and the Bill proceeds on its way to the tatute Book. Main Sinews of the Fight. The commonest way of retarding the progress of the Bill is the discussion of its first clause, the short title. Under this heading the whole scope of the measure is open to criticism, whereas on the subsequent clauses only the particular purpose each provides for can be dealt with. Then on the short title and every subsequent clause there is liberty to move for the excision of words, the substitution of other words, or the insertion of new words or phrases. Again, a diversion may be made by moving that the Chairman report progress to Mr Speaker, with or without leave to sit again, or that the Chairman leave the chair. Either simply reporting progress or voting the Chairman out of the chair will kill the Bill, or at the least, necessitate its committal de novo, and either may be fatal to its reappearance on the Order Paper. Any one of these motions—amendments to the question that the clause be agreed to—gives scope for talk to the full limit of four five-minutes speeches now allowed to each speaker on each motion in committee—on the short title 10 minutes. Narrowing the Track. Up to 1908 there was no time-limit upon speeches, and in committee the clauses of Bills were discussed ad libitum. Hence the special utility to the stonewaller of the scheme devised by Mr W. P. Reeves in the representation stonewall of 1887, when he compiled from a dictionary all the words that could possibly be applied to the Bill, and he and his fellow-stonewallers were able to take whatever time they chose in explaining how each epithet could be used to describe the measure. Such a system might even be proof against the rule which forbids tedious repetition, which has always been a restraint upon obstruction, and has been considerably tightened up in recent years. This narrowing of the stonewaller's track was resorted to with especial strictness by Mr A. S. Malcolm, the Chairman of Committees at the time of the Second Ballot repeal stonewall of 1913. After the hold-up had lasted for some time, Mr Malcolm drew up a list of topics and expressions which he would thenceforward rule to come under the heading of tedious repetition, and he issued further editions as the barrage of talk continued. This plan has been kept up by his successors, and was followed last week with considerable severity by the present Chairman of Committees. A Discourse About Bees. Sometimes there is stonewalling while Mr Speaker is in the chair—the present session had afforded examples, in the prolongation of debates to the full limits of a party’s speaking-power. One amusing example of this system occurred in 1888. upon a motion for the discharge of Bills from the Order Paper —what was known as The annual “slaughter of the innocents.” It so happened that among the 13 doomed measures there was a Foul Brood Among Bees Bill, brought in by Mr Frank La wry, of Auckland. For some reason Mr R. H. J. Reeves (Inangahua) wanted to delay the business of the evening, though he seemed to stand alone in the matter. Accordingly, he occupied a couple of hours with a dissertation upon the importance of the honey industry, the habits of the bee, the economy of the hive, and various other matters relating to the insect and its products. Among other things he tickled the House by stating that honey was an ingredient of Athol brose, which Queen Victoria, then reigning, was known to have patronised. No other member joined in the debate, and the “slaughter” was duly carried out. Lecturettes in the House. Such lecturettes have been JTJTTvered on other stonewalling occasions. Members of 50 years ago have told me that in the Representation stonewall of 1881 an able discourse upon the trees and timbers of New Zealand was given by Mr Richmond Hursthouse, member for Motuelca, who, though an opponent of the Bill, happened to be a nephew of Sir Harry Atkinson, one of the heads of the Ministry that fathered it. His address was described as being so full of original and valuable information that it was a loss to the country to have it given in Committee, when there is no official reporting. There have also been others of the same interest.

Apart from stonewalling, it is worth recalling that quite recently, in the session of 1929, Sir Apirana Ngata, when the Maori “washing-up” Bill was in Committee of the House, delivered what amounted to a lecturette on the history of the West Taupo timber lands apropos of the case of the Tongariro Timber Company, and regret was expressed in the House that it was not on official record. At the instance of the Right Hon. Mr Coates, Leader of the Opposition, Sir Apirana afterwards drew up a summary of his address, and means were found for embalming it in "Hansard,” at the length of more than two pages. How Tom Bracken Sang a Song. One of the most amusing stonewalling incidents that have ever occurred was the unconventional act of Mi’ Thomas Bracken, the poet-journalist-politician, who at the time —in the “eighties”—represented Dunedin Central, and afterwards was a colleague of mine in the Press Gallery, in singing a song in the House. Thomas Bracken was a genial soul, and quite a humorist. During his. membership of Parliament he used to send a weekly letter to the Dunedin “Saturday Advertiser,” purporting to come from “Paddy Murphy,” and addressed as from “Lambton Kay,” describing racily the legislative incidents of the day. These letters were in the dialect of the stage Irishman, and were copiously reprinted by the other papers of the colony at that time. s < One night when the House was in Committee on a Bill, and Mr Bracken

and others were cheerily retarding its progress, he found occasion to reprove a fellow-member, and reminded him of the Scots song, “Behave yersel afore folk.” “Sing it, Tom,” suggested one of his neighbours. And “Tom” forthwith “obliged” by lifting up his voice in the refrain of the song— Behave yersel afore folk, Behave yersel afore folk, Whate’er ye do in ithers’ view, Behave yersel afore folk. The rules of procedure must have been much more lax in those days than those of to-day, but at any rate there was no interference until “Tom” had finished his stave. Material for the Stonewall. The ordinary tactics of stonewallers are prolonged discussions upon the clauses of the Bill under review, the moving and discussion of frequent amendments to their language, and moving that progress be reported or that the Chairman leave the chair. With regard to the “progress” motions, it is now a standing rule that when one such motion has been negatived, there cannot be another until some further progress has been made, even though it be only to the extent of a few words further along the clause. In the case of the Representation Bill of 1881, however, no such rule seems to have applied, for on that occasion motions for "progress” and leaving the chair were pursued alternately, without any intervening business, to the extent of 23 divisions, before the Hon. Mr Gisborne’s selfimmolation brought matters to a crisis. One stratagem commonly resorted to has been the reading of some long official report relevant to the subject under discussion. In one of the representation stonewalls a member who afterwards became one of New Zealand’s most prominent statesmen was among the obstructionists, and he took up an hour or two in reading the electoral roll of his district, and giving the House interesting personal information with regard to each person named. At that period of his history he was rather loose in the use of his aspirates. When he came to the end of the names beginning with K, he turned the page, and with the remark, "We will now go to hel,” proceeded to give further personal particulars. Another device, which in one stonewall was used to a considerable extent, was that of disputing which member had the right to the floor. Two members of the stonewalling party would rise simultaneously. If the Chairman called on Mr A., somebody would move that Mr B. be heard; or ; if Mr B. was called upon, the motion would be in favour of Mr A. There would be disputation as to which of the pair had actually risen first, and eventually the matter would be carried to a division, both the talk and the division serving the purpose of taking up time. Clearing the Galleries. To discourage stonewallers, by depriving them of an audience, it was once a common thing to call attention to the presence of “strangers” and have the galleries cleared. On such occasions, however, the Ladies’ Gallery

was usually excepted. This was the result of a decision gallantly given by Sir Maurice O’Rorke in 1898 that the Ladies’ Gallery was not part of the House, and consequently did not come within his jurisdiction. This dictum was given in connection with a stonewall upon the Estimates of the Seddon Government, which lasted from a Tuesday afternoon till 9 a.m. on the Friday. From just after midnight on the Wednesday to the adjournment the galleries were cleared, avowedly “to give a rest to the ‘Hansard’ reporters,” who had been continuously on duty for 34 hours at the time of the clearance. The matter under discussion was the first item of the Estimates, which gives liberty to rove all over the Estimates, and the motion for clearance was evidently made at the instance of the Government, all the Ministers voting for it. A Prince of Stonewallers. Famous stonewallers, in their days of freedom from the cares of office, were Messrs Seddon and W. P. Reeves, and Sir William Herries. Sir William was a prince of stonewallers, and the chief organiser in such matters when the Reform Party, in Opposition, saw reason for holding up business. He enjoyed the game for its own sake, and J always played it with a smile on his face. Sometimes when a small party was blocking a Bill in which he had no personal concern whatever, he would join in the combat for sheer love of pitting his resourceful w T its against the Government of the day. Almost his last remark to the writer was made when, a few months before his death, the Labour Party was making its first prentice effort at stonewalling against the Government of which he was a member, and was to the _effect that he almost regretted that his Ministerial position prevented him from crossing the floor of the House and “showing them how the game should be played.” The last notable stonewall upon Estimates was that of the Reform Party in 1909 against the Ward Government’s Supplementary Estimates, on account of the inclusion of a vote of £4OO for the Financier Adviser in London (Mr W. P. Reeves), which had just previously been struck out of the General Estimates. The sitting began on Christmas Eve, and members were expecting, until the vote was discovered on the list, that the session would end that night. The discussion prolonged the proceedings over Christmas Day, and the vote was finally passed, the session lasting until 29th December.