POLITICAL NOTES.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 3278, 25 July 1911, Page 5

POLITICAL NOTES.

THE CISBORNE SEAT. DENIAL OF A REPORT. Speaking to a “Times” representative yesterday Dr. Collins remarked that it was not true that he would be a candidate for the Gisborne seat at the next general election. HOW COULD HE SAY IT? ARTISANS AND INTELLIGENCE. One of the questions put to Mr. D. Buick, M.P., at a, meeting he addressed in Palmerston was whether he had not said in the House of Representatives that working men were a lot of fools. Mr. Buick made a telling reply. The incident, he said, was as follows: Mr. T. E. Taylor had compared a successful farmer with an unsuccessful engineer, and asked how it was so many farmers died rich men ? He (Mr Buick) replied, “Perhaps it was brains.” Mr. Taylor had twisted this into his having said that the artisans had no brains. “How could I say such a thing?” said Mr. Buick. “I come from a class from which the best artisans are produced. My father was a carpenter, and my grandfather was a sailor. It was only an accident that I am not an artisan myself.”

EVILS OF THE PARTY SYSTEM. VIEWS OF MR. MYERS, M.P. The party system in polities was discussed by Mr. Arthur Myers in a recent address to his constituents. “A bad effect of this system,” he said, “is that questions corning before the House are seldom or never discussed on their merits. No matter how good a measure brought forward by one party may be ill' itself, it is sure to be opposed by the other party. This may be playing the game of party politics, but it is not calculated, to produce the best results to the community.” Mi-. Myers added that during the discussions on the E. A. Smith case ,and on the Heyes and Hine charges, it was quite clear that members were actuated more by considerations of party than by any impartial desire to elucidate, the truth, in regard to these matters. While not questioning the genuineness of the zeal for purity of administration professed by the Opposition speakers in those debates, he did not think that he was wanting in charity in saying that opportunity for its display would not have been so eagerly seized upon if there had not also been opportunities for attacking the reputation of the Government. * A marble bust of the late Premier (Mr Seddon), which is the work of Mr Felden,. sculptor, is being purchased by the’ Auckland Education Board for the purpolse pf being ?placedi in tne vestibule of the new-Technical College. The Board has agreed to pay £6O tor the bust. A plaster replica of the bust of Mr Seddon which is in Westminster Abbey, has also been presented to the Board by Mrs Seddon, and this will also he placed in. one of the corridors of the college.