The Star. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1834.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5132, 14 October 1884, Page 2

The Star. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 14, 1834.

The Parliamentary proceedings of ; | yesterday are of the deepest interest to j j Canterbury, for they de.il with that long j • suspended question, the West Coast rail- j way. The prediction upon which we j i ventured in our issue of Saturday, that the i Bill would pass the second reading without ! any very serious hindrance, has happily < ' been amply fulfilled, the division list, as ; 1 our correspondent has remarked, wearing ', I somewhat of a ridiculous aspect. There ■ j had been clouds above the horizon, small, : j but ominously dark 5 Southern and \ ' Northern members were supposed to be : i conspiring against the measure, the fire { of interprovincial jealousy still snioul- ; dering, and liable with even a slight \ breeze to burst into fierce flame. Worse - than that, a trio of the Canterbury mem- j bers, it was rumoured, would block the fair way to Canterbury's interests. One of the supposed opponents was the member for Staninore. Some of the honourable gentleman's acquaintances, however, came to the conclusion that he was merely suffering from a passing weakness, which a judiciously prescribed tonic might remove. the tonic took the form of a telegram, sent yesterday afternoon by the Coniinittee of the Industrial Association, and —Mr Eeese's name does not appear amongst the noes. He had been so fortified as to be enabled to walk into the lobby which. Sir George Grey had not favoured. The greatest show of opposition to the im- > portant project was made by the member j for Selwyn, who affected to bo surprised, be- i cause a passing reference to something which he was pleased to term hia conscience made the House laugh. He professed to 1 be alarmed at the proposal of the Government to give favourable terms to a Syndicate willing to undertake the construction of the railway ; he persisted in the assertion that he was more intimately acquainted with the intentions of the Government than were the members of the Government, and — he ostentatiously referred to the husting pledges which he, the one and only saviour of the country, had been good enough to make. It is amusing sometimes, if not very edifying, to take such a man at his word. The member for Selwyn makes a long speech in the House in opposition to the proposal that the East and West Coast Railway shall be constructed, not by the Government, but by a Company, his quibble about " public " versus " private " Companies being unworthy of serious notice. Now let us see what were the hustings viewß to which he refers with such airy grandeur. In the course of a speech delivered on July 8, at Leeston, he is reported to have said : "He had no doubt that if they got a party in office strong enough to resist political pressure, they would be able to get very large public works constructed without resorting to the London money market. He hoped to see the Canterbury and Weatland railway made without the Government raising any loan at all." And then he went on to refer to the concessions which might be granted to a Company undertaking the work. Ah, but all this was with a proviso : if " they " got a party in office. After all, this modern saviour of his country is human, and seems to have been endowed with a more than ordinary share of human frailty. "They" did not get the strong party into office, and as a sequel it is once more demonstrated that disappointed ambition is a stronger motive force than a hustings pledge. The "Noes" of the division list include only two Canterbury names, Wakefield and Eolleston. The latter made no demonstration yesterday j probably he felt too dismal.