THE RAGLAN SEAT

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 90, Issue 3, 4 January 1946, Page 3

THE RAGLAN SEAT

BY-ELECTION EXPECTED

LATE MR. COULTER’S MAJORITY IN 3913 WAS 90

The death of Mr. R. Coulter, M.P. for Raglan, at Timaru on Monday, was the sixteenth that has occurred ajmong sitting members of Parliament since September, 1939, when the war began. Five of the deaths were on active service. By-elections were not held in all cases, an Act being passed in 1943 to cancel by-elections to fill three vacancies, this step being taken because of the approach of the General Election in that year. There will be keen interest in the by-election to fill the Raglan scat, for apart from the fact that at the General Election in 1943 Mr. Coulter s majority was 90 in a four-cornered contest, if. is a mixed farming and mining electorate and cannot be regarded as a Labour stronghold, a fact which has been demonstrated in the nast by the return of other than a Labour representative. The first step in filling the vacancy caused by Mr. Coulter’s death will be a formal notification by the Registrar of Deaths to Mr. Speaker of Mr. Coulter's demise, and Mr. Speaker will then cause a notice of the vacancy to be published in the Gazette. This wilj be followed by the issuing of a writ. Jo fill the vacancy, and it will probably be two or three weeks before that stage is reached. THE OLD RULES

The question has ' already been asked as to whether the by-election will be conducted under the old “rules” or whether the new provisions as contained in the Electoral Amendment Act passed during the last session will apply, namely, the abolition ot the country quota and the fixing of electoral boundaries on adult population instead of on total population. In view of the lung debate in the House on the measure it is a natural enough question to ask. The answer, a “Post” reporter was told yesterday, is that the electorate will be the same as for the General Election in 1943. The representation commissioners whose responsibility it is to fix the electoral boundaries in terms of the Act passed last session and the results as revealed by the census In September last were not appointed until just before Parliament adjourned in December. The commission has not sat yet and it will be some time before it has finished its work and the new electorates are proclaimed, perhaps not until June or July, and by that time the Raglan byelection probably will only be a memory and the new member may have already taken his place in the House. POLLING DAY A matter no doubt to which the Government will have to give some thought will be the question of whether in the light of experience and the fact that more and more people are now enjoying a five-day week it would be in the interests of better polling to hold by-elections (in which usually the voting is not as it should be) and also the General Election an other than a Saturday. The Saturday voting was introduced by the present Government, but there are many who question whether it is the best day for it. There are now many who do not go to work on Saturdays and the number, no doubt, will increase. It is all very well to theorise, but it the weather is very wet It takes more than a polling booth to attract some people, and conversely if, for example, Wellington should happen to experience one of those really wonderful days that citizens have only been able to dream about lately, well, the beach and the great outdoors easily have the edge on a polling booth so far as many are concerned. Compulsory voting, of course, would be a remedy, but New Zealanders do not like compulsion either. It would seem that the question of polling day in elections is one to which some thought may have to be given, although it is possible that that has oeen done already.