THE POLICY OF THE GOVERNMENT.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XVIII, Issue 1217, 27 January 1886, Page 5

THE POLICY OF THE GOVERNMENT.

(Contributed. ) Tho electors of this Colony should be well up in all matters relating to finance. The Ministry of the day is a G-overnment whose main policy is a financial one. The principles of Protection and IVeetrade, by many looked upon as representing the lines of policy of opposing parties are mere opportunities for occasional by-play on the part of our Parliamentary orators. The two leading spirits of the New Zealand House of Eepresentatives today have risen to prominence wholly and solely through their attention to money-raising or money-spending. The Minister of Mines, in his speech at South Dunedin last week, when addressing his constituents, very neatly stated the policy of the Stout- Yogel Government when he said that at the present time over a million of money was sunk in railways which had been commenced years ago and were not yet finished ; therefore this amount had not been productive of revenue for i some years, and would not be unless the Colony realised its position and said, " We will finish the works already begun, and if we find it necessary to commence new ones, in the shape of railways that will be productive, we will have them finished, as quickly as possible." There are times for all things, and although we have always been of opinion that much good was done by the Atkinson party in the way of checking reckless borrowing and of making the country feel to some extent its self-imposed burden, yet there was need for a season of speculative expenditure by the Government on uncompleted public works and on the development of the mining industry. Undoubtedly the leaders of the two opposing parliamentary factions—Sir Julius Yogel and Major Atkinson — are great financiers, and it is well they are on different sides of the House, as the one regulates or has a compensating influence on the other. Therein consists the great utility of party Government. It is, however, to be regretted that parties in the House are at present a little too finely balanced, so much so that neither side can have a working majority ; this will probably be rectified shortly by an appeal to the country, and there seems every probability that, with very slight change perhaps, the present Ministry will remain in power : in the event of a dissolution, Sir William 3?ox has been requested to stand for the Hutt constituency and, if elected, possibly the personnel of the Ministry may be changed so as to include him in the Cabinet. The policy of the present G-overnment has certainly been a good one for the mining districts and if Mr liarnach's utterances on this matter are acted up to, they will do well. He says : — " He would be in favor of giving a liberal aid towards developing, improving, and strengthening the mining industry and taking powers to mine on private lands on an equitable basis, end even to re-purchase lands known to contain mineral treasures under a fair system of valuation. He had found in his travels that a great deal of most valuable mining land was in private hands, and he thought it was very desirable that the State should take power to have mining done on those lands. — (Applause.) Thare could be no question that we had done nothing as yet in the development of our mining resources ; they had only to go through the country as he had done to see that. He believed there was more latent wealth in the Colony than would pay its debt ten times over, and all that was wanted to win it was greater activity." This was quite a new political creed, and betokens a great revolution on the politics of the past. The change is probably due to the consistent, perhaps we might almost say stubborn pertinacity, with which the goldfields members have for years past stood up for a more liberal treatment of the goldflelds districts. Magna est veritas et prcevalebit.