DEGRADATION.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 10925, 14 November 1913, Page 4

DEGRADATION.

It is not too much to say that the Parliament of New Zealand, as at present constituted, is not representative of the wisdom or the intelligence of the people. That is because there is not sufficient inducement for first-class men to enter tho legislative lists. When the public realises that it ought to have the services of first-class men to carry on its affairs it will be prepared to pay a legislator more than it costs a merchant for a high-grade clerk. We cannot blame Parliament for the scene which took place in the legislative precincts last night, because so many of our representatives are not gentlemen, and have no conception of the honourable and decent conduct which usually governs the intercourse of public men. One point was made quite clear, and that is that partisan politics in this country are being reduced to a very low ebb. It is a very serious matter ;when special constables who have taken on the oath of servioe and have enrolled themselves ostensibly for the protection of the public cannot conceal the circumstance that they are primarily the representatives of a political faction. It is a very serious matter when an individual subordinates his country to his politics in the manner so flagrantly disclosed. It really 6eems as if we are going back twenty years, to the time when it was unsafe for men of diverse opinions to hold even the most trivial converse in the streets of our towns and cities. Last night's display of political larrikinism is by no means singular. It has been going on for a session or two now. There is only this difference, that the offenders are growing bolder and their offences against decency and propriety are more flagrant.