PARLIAMENT.

Waka Maori, Volume I, Issue 11, 7 December 1878, Page 161

PARLIAMENT.

HOUSE. Wednesday, 25th September, 1878. DEBATES ON NATIVE QUESTIONS. Mr. Sutton moved, "(1) That it is desirable that such portions of the Hansard reports as refer to matters affecting the Native race should be translated and circulated among the Natives of this colony. (2.) That the Government be requested to make arrangements for the same to be carried out " He said, in moving the motion standing in his name, he thought it was absolutely necessary, now that they were giving the Natives of the colony an extended franchise, to educate them as far as possible by letting them see what took place in the House. It was absolutely necessary that every question affecting the Native interest which was debated in the House should be translated into Maori. It was quite as important that these debates should be translated into Maori as that their debates should be translated into English for the benefit of their English constituents. On the 7th September last year a motion very similar to the one he now moved was proposed by the honorable member for Marsden, and,agreed to. The Government were instructed, by that motion, to have the debate on the second reading of the Native Land Court Bill translated into Maori and circulated. He ascertained from the Native Minister on a previous occa-

sion that that order had been carried out to some extent. The debate had been translated, it had been printed, but he understood the honorable gentleman to say that, for political reasons, it was thought better not to circulate it among the Natives, and that when he made his Native Statement he would go fully into the matter. He was surprised to find that the honorable gentleman did not explain why he thought it was necessary, for political reasons, that the Natives should not know what took place in the House. What they said in the House might surely be reported to the Natives, and he thought it was their duty to see that everything relating to the Maories was translated into their language. With the permission of the House he would make a small amendment in the motion, by substituting the words •' Eeporting Debates Committee," in the second part of the motion, for " the Government." He could not say how it was that the Government did not carry out the orders of the House last session. They understood that this was a Government that would permit the light of day to shine on all its actions. They understood everything was now to be done in the open. But he was surprised that the order of the House in this matter had not been carried out. He hoped the motion would be agreed to, as, from his own knowledge, it was absolutely necessary. He had ascertained that within the last twelve months the only publication , which reached the Natives was a publication conducted under the auspices of the Native Minister. Mr. Sheehast. —No; the honorable gentleman is entirely wrong. Mr. Sutton might be allowed to say that it was conducted and directed by a very intimate friend of the Native Minister. If honorable gentlemen looked at the Wananga they would find that the speeches delivered in the House by the Native Minister—or, at all events, such portions as suited the feelings of the party —were translated and circulated amongst the Maories. Even the Native Minister's speeches were not wholly published, but only such portions as they thought it advisable the Natives should read. He had failed to see the speech of any other honorable member on the Native Land Bill published in the Wananga. He thought that such a state of things shoiild not exist. He hoped the House would see that what they did was published among the Natives as well as among the Europeans of the colony. Mr. Sheeha>* though t that, over and above the the desire to give information to the Native people, there was in the mind of the honorable member a wish to make an attack on himself. He could affoid to submit to such attacks, for he did not think they would damage his reputation in the House or the country, and possibly when the time came that he should reply to them he would reply to them much much more explicitly. (When ?) He would call the honorable " member's attention tothe fact that for. some years there was a paper published by the Government at the expense of the • country in which he could show by dozens of cases that the speeches of those pnly who spoke from the Government benches or side were given to the Maori people, while himself and others professing to have a knowledge of Maori matters were put aside with a paragraph of two or three sentences. That was a Government paper, published by the Government, and paid for by tbe colony. When he was in professional business be was connected with the Wananga, and they went

upon precisely the same track ; and, as the Waka Maori did not give them fair play, they devoted a large space of the Wananga to putting their own views before the Maori people. That was perfectly fair and proper. The honorable member for Napier acted very improperly in saying the Wananga was now under his supervision. It was unfair to make such a statement without some inquiry. He had not written a line for that paper since he took office, and he believed, conscientiously, he had not seen more than three numbers of it. He had certainly not read more than two or three, and in those two or three numbers he found a large amount of space devoted to motions brought forward by the honorable member for Napier himself. At present there were two organs published in the Maori language — the Wananga and the Waka Maori —issued by private persons, and he believed, himself that by those two papers ample information might be given . to the Maori people upon all questions brought forward in the House. "What they were concerned in were debates bearing on Maori matters. Those were not very numerous, and the debates were not very lengthy, and by those two papers the information sought for could be fairly supplied, and supplied independently without any power on tie part of the Government to determine what amount of information should be given. (It is true that the Government have no power to dictate to the Waka, but it is a different matter with respect to their organ, the Wananga.) He might say at once that they would absolutely decline, as a Government, to be called upon to select for publication the debates that took place in this House. It was an unfair position to put the Government in, as, no matter how fairly they made the selection, their opponents would say that they had inserted only that which supported their own case, and omitted that which damaged it. (Precisely what they and their supporters have been doing in their Pakeha newspapers and in the Wananga.) He would move, as an amendment, that the question be referred to the • Reporting Debates Committee for their consideration and report. If the Committee reported that it was advisable to give effect to the motion of the honorable gentleman, they could suggest some arrangement by which a selection of the kind referred to might be made. [For want of space we are obliged to leave the concluding part of the above debate for our next issue. Meanwhile we may remark that Mr. Sheehan's statement that the speeches only of Government supporters were published in the old Waka is, in a great measure, incorrect. Of course the wild and random assertions ma3e by members of the Sheehan type were rejected by the Editor ; and the proof that Mr. Sheehan considered such speeches (including his own) highly objectionable, is to be found in the fact that when he became Native Minister he refused to allow the debate on the Native Lands Bill of 1877 to be circulated among the Maories, although all the speeches on that sub-, ject were translated and printed by order of the previous Government for circulation among the N*a-» tive tribes throughout the colony. Our Native readers will see by this that Mr. Sheehan is not so, ingenuous as he professes to be when stump,ing--the country —there are things which his dear Native friends. in our session the translation ofxhe debate to which we have referred, and nothing but want of space prevents ijs from publishing it at once. We note that the Wananga, the exponent of Maori views and grievances ", to the whole world," is not even read.

by the friendfof the Maories, the Native Minister! Think of that! ye sons of Maui and budding - politicians .' nor waste your strength in vain scribbling to the winds—patronize the Waka, and your letters; will no longer be as a sealed book to the Native Minister, your friend and our friend, because we know that he reads the Waka with great interest. The Native Mininster thinks the Waka ought to publish parliamentary speeches; that being the case r why has he not the courtesy to send us copies of Hansard ? At present, we have to pay the Grovarnment for the parliamentary information which we afford our readers.]