The Manawatu Daily Times Electoral Reform

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 7280, 6 October 1933, Page 6

The Manawatu Daily Times Electoral Reform

Though at one time or another in the days of their political youth both tvlr. Forbes, the Bi'into Minister oi to-day, and Mi. Coates, his Minister of Finance, gave their support to proposals fox* the application of pi'oportional rei’csentation to the Legislative Council of the Dominion, neither of them now seems disposed to facilitate this progressive measure. The cifect of such a step would be to place the Second Chamber of the Dominion’s Parliament in the hands of the electors upon a broad basis equitable to the whole community. As matters stand at present the Prime Minister of the day—with the approval, of course, of His Excellency the Governor-General —can enlarge the numerical strength of the Council to any size he may please. This being the case, at present, Mr. Forbes would not be without parallel if he asked the Governor for a dozen more Councillors. He may do so.

One of the Christchurch dailies, referring to this subject, as it has done on and off for many years, finds it, as it well may, a little confusing. “There is no doubt,” it says, “that the method of nomination by the Government tends to keep the Council out of touch with the current opinion, and the method of election by large constituencies would, theoretically at any rate, bring well-known and experienced citizens into public life so that the reform would be a most desirable one. But while public opinion would undoubtedly approve of the change the present difficulty could not be overcome merely by bringing the Act of 1914 into operation. At the best there could be no election until 1935.” The provision for the revival of the Act of 1914 is still in existence, but after a lapse of nineteen years it would be hopeless to present Sir Francis Bell’s carefully framed measure.

The southern authority, referring to the suspension of the Legislative Council Act, suggested, somewhat obscurely, that in recommending a “small number” of appointments to the Legislative Council forthwith. “The alternative,” it stated, ‘ ‘ would be to allow the terms of the present members to run out and then to abolish the institution. This particular view would commend itself to quite a large number of people, although the issue could scarcely be decided unless it were first submitted to the constituencies at a general election.” This would mean that seven years would be employed in disposing of the present twenty-four members of the Council, four of whom have only just now been appointed and will not be subject to retirement until late in 1940, one of them remaining to reach the good old age of ninety.

Just what the authorities would do with the remnants of the Legislative Council as they declined to twenty, fifteen, ten and five, and finally to disappearance, it is painful to imagine; but that apparently is the tragedy that would haunt the galleries and the vacant chairs were the dissolution of the Council continued to the bitter end. The Act which passed through both Houses of Parliament in 1914, and subsequently was stayed at the will of the Governor-General of the day in order that the two parties in the House, then closely balanced in numbers, might labour wholeheartedly together, is still on the Statute Book in a suspended or forgotten condition. It is not likely, however, that the Second Chamber of the Parliament of the Dominion will disappear altogether. The Labour party, at any rate, should save the country from such a catastrophe and now there is its opportunity fbr real reform.