Current Comment.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXII, Issue XVIII, 6 May 1899, Page 609

Current Comment.

The results of Government anti of municipalities dabbling in works of private enterprise have been, in this colony, and, indeed, in most other places, far from reassuring (says the Christchurch ‘Press'). We end, therefore. as we began, by saying that if the capitalist is to be shut out, and we are to depend on Government and the municipalities taking his place, God help New Zealand! The question as to whether eo-operative co-partner-ship can efficiently replace the capitalist cannot now be gone into at length, but it is notorious that, in the older countries, while co-operative distribution has been a success, cooperative production—on which the development of our industries would have to depend—has been a great disappointment.

We are satisfied that teachers are giving the older children too little to do at home, and that consequently there is less progress being made than formerly. We are quite aware that the other extreme was gone to, leading to a general outcry against home lessons, and that the teachers' hands are now tied in this connection; but a moderate quantity of home lessons is not only very helpful to the children, but occuipies them profitably and pleasantly in their homes. thus preventing too much idling aoout the streets and waste of time in other ways. These are the opinions of the Mosgiel School Committee as embodied in their annual report.

It is a curious fact (declares the ‘Morning Press') that while the Liberal party in Britain is rent by inward dissensions, the Conservative party in this, the most,distant from Britain of the self-governing colonies, should be in like plight. Owing to family afflictions, the existence of which we all deeply deplore, the Leader of the Conservative party, Captain Russell, has been unable to publicly announce the policy of the Opposition. His lieutenants have been making trial of their nowers, bu,t, like the English farmer imbibing claret, ‘they don’t get no forrader.’ Tn fact, they have but made confusion worse confounded, and the Conservative party stands confessed ‘a thing of shreds and patches.’

How anyone—even a magistrate—is to ascertain what was in a publican’s mind at the time he served a glass of beer to a man who professed to be a traveller is to us an insoluble problem. The whole onus of serving a man who is not a traveller should be placed upon the hotelkeeper. There is a grave danger that the guilty may escape and the innocent suffer if the treatment of offenders is to be in accordance with what a magistrate thinks they thought when the drink was served.—‘Oamaru Mail.’ ♦ ♦ ♦ He Mr Monk (at Henderson) warned the country settlers against the insidious attempt there was to increase taxation upon them, and abolish the £5OO exemption. + + + ‘Nothing eoujd have brought home more sternly to Ministers the suicidal policy of interference with departmental heads than their experience in this case. The officials were obviously anxious to be allowed to do their duty. Had they done so Capta’n Jones would have been shut out, and the present scandal could never have arisen. There is a very grave suspicion about that this matter has not yet been probed to the bottom, that Minister s have not by any means cleared ” themselves, and that the whole truth as to how far they influenced the issue of the certificate will not be known Uintil after Captains Allman and .Tones have been force I to open their mouths through a criminal prosecution.’ This is what the 'Wanganui Chronicle’ thinks of I’alTair Allman and .Tones. + ♦ ♦ Speaking of Mr Taylor's disgust with the corruption, etc., in pblitics. and his idea of retiring, the Oamaru ‘Mail’ says:—‘We can sympathise with Mr Taylor. It is very annoying to find that the people with whom we are compelled to mix are not so good as ourselves. We have, in journalism, had to deplore the wickedness of all other journalists, and have been driven to contemplate with an almost irresistible longing, whnt a happy.

holy and prosperous time we should have if the Oamaru “Mail" were the only paper shedding its political and social effulgence all around. But we are not going to commit journalistic suicide because others less virtuous are striving to check our beneficent operations. It is under sueh circumstances as these that the true man is wanted. Those who persist in the right will come out victorious in the end; and. if Mr Taylor's success does not come up to his own expectations is it not possible that there may be some little fault on his own side? It is not in good form to contemplate self-effacement because of the opposition of .those who are neither so wise nor so righteous as ourselves. We should rather pity sueh misguided specimens of humanity, and sacrifice our all in trying to lift them up. Mr Taylor should also reflect that if his opponents are a nuisance to him he is. perhaps, more than a nuisance to his opponents.’ ♦ ♦ ♦

At last the Opposition, the Conservative party, has a policy it is the policy of despair. Mr Itolleston's speech has carried dismay with it into every Conservative eamp in the colony. Apart from the personal abuse, aimed at the Premier, there is nothing in the speech of the member for Riecarton that is not complimentary to the present Government, and in a breath Mr Rolleston has swept away the notion of the autocracy of Mr Seddon by telling the people what is absolutely true, namely, that no man or set of men can rule this colony unless with the approval of the people of the colony.—Wairarapa 'Leader.'

With regard to Old Age Pensions Mr Monk said he was in favour of a universal pension, with annual appropriations, and he would support a vote of either £50.000 or £60,000 to be distributed among the needy.

We think that we know as much as most people in regard to the appointments which have been made by the Government, says the Oamaru 'Mail.' and whilst we know that many' positions have been given to the Government's enemies, we know of no instances in which positions have been given solely because the applicants were Government supporters. What the Otago ‘Daily Times' and those whom it represents appear to desire is tnat no Liberal shall be given a position in the Government service, so that he may be imide to feel the personal disadvantages of being a Liberal and compelled to support the Tories, who are always faithful to their friends.

One thing, at any rate, seems quite certain that no public school can ever be carried on satisfactorily in which one section of the pupils, however small, enjoys an immunity from corporal punishment. An essential feature of the system is uniformity of treatment —in the eye of the law (and to the credit of the teachers, almost invariably in practice) the whole of the scholars are on an equal footing, enjoying the same privileges and subject to the same penalties each as the other. For those parents who desire exceptional treatment for their children private tuition or private schools are the only recourse.- Thus the Southland ‘Times’ on the Vexed Corporal Punishment question.

it is no exaggeration to say that in many schools there is a gross abuse of the assumed right to punish scholars among the subordinate masters. Too often the unoffending youngsters are subjected to floggings altogether out of proportion to their misdeeds. For instance, in one institution, failure to spell a word correctly, inability to write without inky fingers, incapacity to remember the date of the battle of Agincourt, or whether a verb is transitive or intransitive, were all visited with an application of the strap. It would be a waste of words to point out the absurdity, even the brutality, of such tactics as these.--N.Z. ‘Times' on the same subject. . + + +

Had the Noxious Weeds Bill become law in the form in which it was before the House, a number of Northern settlers would have been compelled to leave their homes. There were some districts, however, where blackberry and briars were so rife that if the settlers were ordered to clear them it would be better for them to leave their homes.— Mr Monk. M.H.R., at Henderson.