Queensland

Parliamentary Debates [Hansard]

Legislative Assembly

WEDNESDAY, 2 AUGUST 1893

Electronic reproduction of original hardcopy

Supplg. [2 AUGUST.] Supply. 325

LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY.

Wednesday, 2 August, 1893.

Railway Commissioners' Travelling Expenses.-Supply: Want of Confidence :Motion; Commlttee.-1Ieat and Dairy Produce Encouragement BilL-Co-operative Communities Land Settlement Bill.-A.djoumment.

The SPEAKER took the chair at half-past 3 o'clock.

RAILWAY COMMISSIONERS' TRAVEL­LING EXPENSES.

Mr. LOVEJOY asked the Colonial Secretary, in the absence of the Secretary for· Railways­

What amount has been paid to the Railway Com­missioners for travelling expenses since their appoint­ment?

The COLONIAL SECRETARY (Hon. H. Tozer) replied-

I regret that the Secretary for Railways is stlll too indisposed to be present, and I answer the question for him-

The amount paid to the Railway Commissioners for travelling expenses since their appointment in July, 1'89, until the 30th June, 1893, is as follows:-

J. Mathieson, Chief Commissioner, £700 6s.; A.. Johnston, Commissioner, £482 7s. 3d.; R. J. Gray, Commissioner, £129 Ss.

SUPPLY. W A.NT OF CoNFIDENCE MoTION.

Resumption of adjourned debate on Mr. Nelson's motion, "That the Speaker do now leave the chair"; upon which Mr. Powers had moved that the question be amended by the omission of all the words following the word "That," with a view to the insertion, in their place, of the words "the financial proposals of the Government are not satisfactory to this House, because those who are best able to bear the necessary burden of retrenchment and taxa· tion are not called upon to do so under the proposals submitted."

Mr. KINGSBURY: Gentlemen on this side of the House labour under peculiar difficulties in speaking at this stage of the debate, because what need not have been a vote of want of confi­dence has been transformed into a vote of that nature owing, I think, to the imperfect judg­ment of the leader of the Opposition. There are members on this side who think the financial proposals of the Go•ernment could in many ways be amended, but criticism of the way the amendments might he effected would only strengthen the uncnJled-for and unjustifiable nature of the want of confidence motion. Had the Opposition wanted to silence members on this side by bringing forward something in favour of which they could not speak, they have succeeded in doing so. The arguments with which they have endeavoured to strengthen their opposition have been successful in one thing.

They have destroyed each other, very much as the Kilkenny cats did. One member is in favour of the reduction of the vote for education, and that is one of the reasons why the Ministry should be turned out of office; because they have not sufficiently reduced it. Another thinks the reduction too great. One member thinks the Defmce Force should be swept out of existence. Those are the words of the junior member for Toowoomba, Mr. Groom. Another member sitting alongside of him thinks the Defence Force should on no account be interfered with; therefore, as the Ministry have interfered with it, they should be swept out of existence. One hon. member thinks that taxa­tion should be placed upon land. He has perhaps got "single tax," as they call it, on the brain, and nothing but a surgical oper:ttion will remove it. Another gentieman thinks taxation on land is wrong. He Bays we are forcing the divisional boards to put taxation on land by withdrawing their subsidy. Well, these arguments right across from one side of the Opposition to the other have succeeded in destroying each other, or else have proved that there is no cohesion in this Opposition, where they stand on their indi­vidual basis, as they are doing. But they are not going to stand singly or individually. IN e have been informed by the hon. memberfor Mary­borough, Jl.fr. Powers, that they are going to meet the Government in a different spirit. He says they are g·oing to meet the Government as an organised Opposition. ·what doe• an organised Opposition mean? When we hear the phrase "organised mob" used, we know what it means. We know what an organised body of forces means ; and an organised Opposition means a well-drilled Opposition, who will follow a leader, competent or incompetent, through thick and thin, whether they believe exactly that he is doillg right or wrong. If they are ordered to turn a ship in six cables' length when she can only turn in twelve, they will do it, even though in doing it they sink a priceless treasure. We do not want that kind of thing in this House, if our object is the good government of the country. I am sorry that the ex-leader of the Opposition has been retrenched. I do not like retrenchment, but the Opposition has become an organised one, and therefore previously it must have been <lis­organised. That is a very poor compliment to the hon. member for Burke, Mr. Hoolan, whom we hold in the highest respect.

HoNOURABLE MEMBERS of the Opposition: Oh, oh!

Mr. KINGS BURY: He is a far more sym­pathetic gentleman than the new leader of the Opposition. When he has anything caustic or sarcastic or hurtful to say, he feels so keenly the wound he is going to inflict that he close.s his eyes that he may not see the pain. The new leader of this organised Opposition has got various remedies to propose, but he does not venture to say that any or all of them will be effective. He would be disclosing too much if he were to tell us the way out of our difficulties, because he did not know one. He proposes an income tax, but at the same time he ad­mits that the people are poor. He talks about mandates from the people. Have we got any mandate from the people in favour of an income tax? He urges the House to put that burden on the people, without having mentioned such a thing at the general election. They did mention re~renchment, reductions, and dismissals, but an income tax they did not mention. The leader of the Opposition objects tu additional taxation through divisional boards; he says the reduction of the subsidy to those boards is additional taxation, and the Ministry should be turned out because they propose it.

326 Supply. [ASSEMBLY.] Supply.

In the same breath he proposes an income tax. The Ministry should be turned out becauee they propose additional taxation, and they should be turned out because they do not propose additional taxation. That is a fair specimen of the logic used by the hon. member. Another reason why the divisional boards should get their old rate of subsidy is because they are not able to pay for what they have already got. If they are not able to provide interest and sinking fund for what they have already got, surely that _is a very poor argument for giving them more. The hon. member used a most extraordinary phrase in objecting to the Ci vi! Service reductions. He says the bulk of the re­ductions have fallen upon the Civil servants, "while those outside are allowed tn escape free." A more extraordinary statement has never been heard from a man of presumed intelligence. If people outside have escaped soot-free, how is it that the colony is depressed- men out of employment, businesses closed, and in sol vencies on the right hand and on the left? It is because mercantile and manufacturing men­men who employ htbour, and labour itself, are suffering from depre~ciion. Outsiders have escaped scot-free ! I say there is not a man in Brisbane who has not in the past two or three years suffered a reduction of from 50 per cent. upwards in his income. If the hon. gentle­man has himself escaped scot-free, he is one of the fortunate few whose hearts should swell up with sympathy for those who have suffered. He tells us that the pitiable condition in which the colony is, is attributable to the Government and their predecessors, and therefore the present Government should be turned out. Who were their predecessors ? The h on. m em her has suc­cessfully endeavoured to class himself amongst them ; and if the blame is attributable to the Government and their predecessors, as one of the most important of their predecessors he must take his share of the blame on his own shoulders. He was in office much longer than some of the members of the present Government ; and if the blame is upon their predecessors, why should their predecessors come back again in the person of the leader of the Opposition? Finding himself short of argument to defeat the Government, the hon. member makes some cheap sneers at Italians. It is very bad grace in a colony like this, allied to the Crown, that we should sneer at any of the leading nations of Europe. If we consider what Italy has done for the world in times past, and that she is a first-class power to-day, with a navy second only to that of England, and that in literatmre, arts, science, and law she has led and will again lead the world, sneers at Italians are out of place and beneath the dignity of the new leader of the Opposition.

Mr. POWERS: I did not sneer. Mr. KINGSBURY: But he proves conclu­

sively that the Government have made mistakes in other directions. One is a small matter worthy of beimg brought forward iu an attack on the Ministry, when the sole object is attack and not logic. He says the Government have taken no steps to stop the overflow of artesian water. That is the best argument the leader of the Opposition has br0ught forward. Of course, it would be no use if the artesian water did not overflow ; but the moment it commences to over­flow the Government should stop it or else lay down the reins of office and hand them over to the hon. member for l\'Iaryborough. He gives

· us another method of improving affairs in the colony when he says that our exports of wool, hides, and tallow should be exports of cloth, leather, and candles.

Mr. POWERS: Don't you talk of protection,

Mr. KINGS BURY: I know the hon. member has left the camp. \Ve have to tax clothing, leather and candles because we cannot produce them f~r export. Notwithstanding a tax of from 25 per cent. upwards on these three articles, we are to export them. How~ Echo answers, "How?" and no other reply will come. If the colony is to be saved by clothing, leather, and candles, the sooner the leader of the Opposition takes the Government benches and does it the better. Not content with dealing with general questions, personalities are indulged in ; and we are told that the Secretary for Lands will sail under the ,Japanese or any other flag, or under the communistic flag of Griffith, to get his salary. It is needless to com­ment on such remarks, and especially on the remark concerning the Chief Justice of the colony. We are told that the Ministry have been twice defeated. That statement is not correct. They have not been once defeated. There must be a majority against a Ministry to secure their defeat, and a magnifying glass must have been used to see a defeat of the Ministry in a catch vote secured in a thin House, making both sides equal.

Mr. FISHER : What about those out~ide the bar?

Mr. KINGSBURY: When the House was told that Ministers had decided to take 10 per cent. off their own salaries, the hon. gentle­man interjected that his amendment had been succc,_,sful. If he really meant that, the only course open to him now, as a man of kindly feeling, is to withdraw his amendment and bring this desultory debate to an end. If his amendment has been successful, the hon. gentle­man and members on both sides of the House should be satisfied. We have been told that the heads of,departments have not been dealt with sufficiently severely. In some cases the heads of departments have been dealt with seriously, and in some they have been dismissed. I cannot go into details. In one department the services of the head of the department have been dispensed with, though he is a man who has been twenty­one years in the service, and was, I believe, the best man in the place. •

The HoN. B. D. MOREHEAD: Is that why he was dispensed with?

Mr. KINGSBUitY: I believe that is so in other cases which could be mentioned, but hon. members say let us cut down the salaries of superior officers by 25 per cent., intermediate by 15 per cent., and the rank and fi:e by 5 per cent., and we will get efficiency. There is a great deal in that at firot sight, and it seems equitable; but what would be the effect of cutting down the salary of the head of a department in that way? The efficiency of the office would suffer if he lost heart in his work. If retrenchment is necessary, it must not be unfair to the head of a depart­ment, who was in the position of a captain of a ship. If you want to make reductions in the sea-going service you make thAm equitably, from the captain down to the sailors.

Mr. POWERS : Hear, hear ! Mr. KINGSBURY: But if you take 25 per

cent. off the captain and 5 per cent. off the men the capt,'1in will lose heart in his work and will not ·maintain discipline, and for the sake of a paltry saving in his salary you sacrifice the dis­cipline of the ship and perhaps the lives of those on hoard. If the Civil Service is to be efficient the he,:<ds of departments must not be placed in such a position that they will lose interest in their work, and that, I think, would be the effect of making such differential reductions as some members think necessary. Others object to any Civil Service dismissals, and I think dismissals

Supply. [2 AuGusT.] Supply. 327

from the service should be the last thing to which any Government should have recourse. Yet we have sufficient confidence in the men who occnpy the position of governors of this country to know that they would not have made dismissals if it could have been avoided. To prove that it could not have been avoided, the hon. member for Flinders tells us that the Oi vi! Service is overmanned. Other gentlemen sitting with him object to the dismissals. The one argument kills the other. The same hon. member tells us that the men who have been dismissed are men in inferior positions, and that they should not have gone. To prove that men in inferior positions should not have been dismissed, he tells us of one man in an inferior position who was put in by political influence, and who could not read the clock. It is certainly about time such a man left the service.

An HoNOURABLE MEMBER: He is still there. Mr. KINGSBURY: The same hon. member

laughs at the idea of increased production pro­ducing prosperity. He thinks it is a most absurd statement to appear in the 1'reasurer's Speech. He proves, in fact, that while production has increased the country has appareptly become poorer, or, at least, that the people have become poorer. While increased production has not produced prosperity, he proposes further pro­duction, because he ad vacates another Northern railway line which would be reproductive. If producti'm does not cause prosperity, why should not reproduction? That is very good logic for the hon. member for Flinders. The ex-leader of the Opposition, who has been retrenched--

Mr. HOOLAN: No; he has only been re­constructed.

Mr. KINGSBURY: That hon. member made the most temperate speech, I think, that h11s been made on that side of the House. For the time being, I almost wished I was sitting next him, because he voiced my sentiments absolutely. I will read a quotation or two. I have written them down verbatim, and I have a copy of Hansard if he doubts their correctness. He says, "I have no wish to turn the Government out." Neither have I. " They are men of great mental calibre and keen intellect." I quite agree with him. "The Government should not take the amendment as anything approaching a malicious intention of depriving them of office." With that I also agree. Why the ex-leader of the Opposition has been retrenched I cannot tell, excepting, perhaps, that the admi­ration he has expressed for the Government has given umbrage to other members of his party. If so, I sympathise with him thoroughly. He objects to the reductions in the Education Department. Perhaps he is right. He does not think we should do anything that might impair the efficiency of that department; and to prove that the Education Department is a boon to the colony, he tells us that there are highly educated men walking about the streets who would be glad to work for one meal a day and a kind word. If education will do that, it cannot be an object--

Mr. HOOLAN: I was referring to an M. A., who belongs to a broken bank.

Mr. KINGSBURY : If his bank has broken, I am very SOITY for both him and the bank. The hon. member goes on to say that there are many more ways of saving money than are disclosed in the Estimates. \V e have not had retrenchment enough for the hon, member for Burke, and when the Estimates are under discussion I expect to see him working with hon. members on this side of the House in making further reductions. I am certain the Treasurer will receive his suggestion, at least,

with consideration, if not approval. Some hon. me m hers think the education vote should be further reduced, others comp!ttin of its being reduced at all, and others want to put it back to what it was before. It is impossible to satisfy them all, so there i~ no use anyone trying. The hon. member for Bulloo says we cannot be prosperous at this time because with higher duties we get less revenue. Those higher duties are protective duties about which the hon. member is well posted up, and he must knqw that their object is to keep out goods and decrease revenue. He should not complain of higher duties reducing revenue, or use it as an argument. He also says we want more retrenchment, as t0 which he is in accord with the hon. member for Burke. The hon. member for Charters Towers wants an income tax on absentees. With that we should be delighted, and if he can effect it he will have the entire sympathy of the House. But the trouble is, How is he going to effect it? "\Ve have got a decision within the last eighteen months from the House of Lords-and as long as we remain associated with Great Britain that decision must have weight--to the effect that you can only tax income which a man derives from the country where you impose the tax and where he lives. That is ·known as the Brookes case, Bv that decision an income tax on absentees· is an impossibility. The same hon. member tells us that the people are very poor, and yet he will support the old di vision~tl board subsidy. That subsidy is really a subsidy to assist in making roads for propP.rty. Why the people of the colony-the poor, suffering people-should be taxed to make roads for property passe3 my comprehension. That hon. member is always talking about "the neople." It is his pet phrase. On one occasion he used it twenty-two tin>es in eight minutes. I believe he thinks he does represent the people. If so, why not tax land ? \Vhy not do away with all endowment to divisional boards, and let property make its own roads? 'What is wanted at present is sympathy for the Govern­ment. If ever any Ministry deserved kindly criticism it is the present 2.V[inistry. ]'ew men in this House would have cared to occupy the office they have occupied during the past three months. From morning till night they have had to listen to complaints from individuals who have been thrown out of work by the policy of retrenchment which the colony demanded of them. Personally, I would sooner have been a grave-digger than a member of the present Ministry during the last three months. But there has been no kindly sympathy shown to­wards them in their painful position ; and yet I should not think it possible to choose, in this House, six men equally fitted to take their places on the Treasury bench. I have looked round to find if it was practicable to get six men to take their seats who have anything like the ability of the present Government. I shuffied the cards in imagination so thoroughly without success that at last I threw them, metaphorica.lly, into the fire. We have been given no alternative scheme, no alternative Government. There is but one alternative, and that is a general election. Whether that would do anything to promote the prosperity of the colony has to be left to the logic of those who have brains. The Government may have made mistakes in details, and it should be qnite possible to make altemtions and improvements in committee; but all those who think sincerely, and are not members of organisations, think the Government have done their best. They h~tve acted without considerations of self-interest; they have acted impartially towards friends and foes ; they have dismissed some of the best friends

328 Supp1y. [ASSEMBLY.] Supply.

they ever had, and have created many enemies in so doing. They have tried to hold the scales of justice absolutely fair and square. They are men of ability, and men without whom the country would be badlr off at present. The complaint that the Civil Service has been too much retrenched will not bear looking into. If a mercantile man had been asked to deal with the Civil Service, he would have made the officers, first of all, work mercantile hours-from 9 o'clock to 6 o'clock, with an hour for dinner. By doing that he would have increased the working capacity of the men by one-fourth, and would have been enabled to part with one-fourth of them. We have not parted with one-tenth. The Civil Service has grown owing to political in­fluence in the past-and chiefly owing to the poli­tical influence of Liberal Governments-to such dimensions that it forms a menace to the colony. It is a non-producing service, a consuming ser­vice. One-tenth of the adult male population is in the Civil Service; and when the Government comes forward prepared to do something to put us back to where we ought to have been, they are harassed with petty arguments and petty complaints-complaints which destroy them­selves-and harassed in a way utterly unworthy of a worthy leader of the Opposition, had they a worthy leader; and were they a worthy Oppo­sition.

Mr. REID : I really expected that the junior member for North Brisbane would have told us something worth listening- to ; but he got up in a very schoolboy fashion and criticised a great many speeches delivered during the debate. He used a great· deal of criticism, which, if it were boiled down and dished up on the time-payment system, would hardly induce people to take shares in the company. He had all night to prepare his speech ; he was assisted by other hon. members in the library last night, and he had the whole morning to dress it up. He generally gets his speeches off by memory, and I am very disappointed with the criticism we have had. He has been very careful not to find one fault with the Financial Statement. He first said he did not agree with all the Go­vernment proposals, but, because the leader of the Opposition had brought forward this amend­ment, he was compelled to back up the Govern­ment. If the Government requires to be backed up by the hon. member for North Brisbane, it must be very weak. He had a great deal to say about the cohesion of the Opposition side ; but I may tell him the Labour party is in the same position now as on the day when it entered the House. However, if we have many opportnnitieR of hearing the eloquence of the hon. member, we shall soon be veryintelligentmembersofthe party. The Opposition will have all the support the Labour party can give in any policy they may bring forward in opposition to the Government. I do not say any policy the Opposition like to bring forward will receive our support, but any policy the Labour party consider proper. 'l'he leader of the Labour party, as at present constituted, has not the same power to whip his lambs into the Government paddock as the present Premier has. Members on this side are not blind fol­lowers of anybody; and I think the leader of the Opposition was quite correct when he said the Government had nearly suffered two defeats. 1i'V e all remember the Border Tax Bill, and I admire the Premier more than ever I did.,when I saw how he whipped his lambs into the paddock the next day. I do not say there was a drought in that paddock, for the grass was long, and once they were inside the fence they were bound to remain there. The junior lamb for North Bris­bane has carried out his lamb-like instincts and given a very mild criticism to the Government, so that I really think the grass in the paddock is

so good that he is losing the vitality he had dur- · ing the election. I must say, on behalf of the Labour party, that we owe the hon. member thanks for many things. He is composed of as many varieties as the chameleon, which he resembles in many ways. First of all, when he entered upon his political career, he used the Patriotic League to assist the Worker to dis­seminate socialism throughout the whole colony. After the Patriotic League found that he used them for the purpose of sending out extracts from the W01·ker to bring people up to his standard of socialism, they got rid of him. After he had assisted to smash up the Queensland Del•osit Bank be started the Equitable confi­dence trick, a.nd whether he is going to betray the public or not remains to be seen. After that he was picked up by the freetrade section of the electorate of North Brisbane to run with his colleague for North Brisbane at the general election, and his financial abilities were so great that before he finished--

Mr. DALRYJHPLE: I rise to a point of order. Has the private business of the hon. member for North Brisbane anything to do with

· this debate? The SPEAKER: I do not think the hon.

member for Toowong is trangressing the rules of the House.

Mr. REID : I was alluding to the financial abilities the junior member for North Brisbane had shown in the past; and I was going to show that, if the Chief Secretary or the Colonial Treasurer is taken awa.y in the natural course of time, we have a heaven-born financier in the person of the junior member for North Brisbane. The hon. member says that the Ministry deserves all our sympathy, and that he would rather be a grave-digger than occupy a seat on the Ministerial bench. I believe the grave in­dustry is rather quiet just now; but I represent Toowong, where there is a large cemetery, and when the hon. member loses his seat I will wait on the trustees and try to get him a job in the cemetery. The bon. member made a funny remark with regard to what the leader of the Opposition said about the overflow of artesian water. I say that a large number of those bores are running continually, and a number of them are sunk so close to one another that it is becoming a serious question, and the Govern­ment will have to •tep in and see that there is a proper distance between them, and that the water is turned off when it is not required.

An HoNOURABLE MEMBER : What would be­come of the casing?

Mr. REID : If the hon. member will read Mr. Henderson's report he will find an answer to that question. Members on this side have been accused of being opposed to retrenchment. We are opposed to the system adopted by the Go­vernment in their retrenchment, but we are not opposed to the retrenchment of the Civil Service or any otfice under Government that requires retrenchment. I hold that no Government has a right to create convalescent homes for Civil servants or anybody else, and that when the service is efficiently manned it is not the duty of the Government to keep any man who is not required. Retrenchment has been a great elec­tion Cl')' in the past, and I give the Government all credit for taking the matter up ; and though we are in opposition to the retrenchment proposals of the Government as a whole, we will support them on those proposals which we consider right, and I trust that in some cases more retrenchment will be effected by the House than has been proposed by the Government. They have taken the low salaries and cut many of them down ; and many of those reduced salaries are subject to the 10 per cent. deduction.

Suppty. [2 AuGusT.] Supply. 329

The COLONIAL SECRETARY Where have they done that?

Mr. REID : I suppose the hon. member wants me to break the rules of the House by referring to items ; but they will be pointed out when the E;;timates come on for consideration. I would suggest to the Government that, instead of cutting down lump sums, and then bringing the reduced salaries under the 10 per cent. deduction, there is a more eq_uitable way of dealing with the Civil servants. The junior member for North Brisbane referred to cutting down the pay of the captain of a ship 25 per cent., and that of the crew 5 per cent. ; and said that by doing so you at once do away with the efficiency of the captain. Though you may do this, the captain is only one; but if you reduce the pay of the crew unjustly, the ship runs a greater risk of not being manned properly than if the captain is reduced in the manner spoken of by the hon. member. The hon. member for Mackay said it was a wonder the Civil servants had not demanded a conference to consider their posi­tion. I say that they can have a conference here. We have their employers on the bench in front of us, and some of us can stand on the floor of the House as delegates on behalf of the Civil servants to obtain justice for them. I suggest to the Government the advisability of exempting from the 10 per cent. tax all salaries up to £200.

The COLONIAL TREASURER (Hon. H. M. Nelson): You can propose an amendment in the Bill.

Mr. REID : I think Ministers know as well as I do that, as far as amendments pro­posed by the Opposition are concerned, the Government lambs will put the goats on this side down straight away. We are not likely to defeat the Government on this amend­ment. \Ve have not the least hope,and I am not very anxious that we should do so. I am not so very anxious to put the present Government out, because I am of opinion that Governments are all bad alike. I am like the Irishman -I am always "agin the Government." I always like to be against the Government, because I know that I am then right. If I became in favour of a Government, I should fancy at once that I was going off the straight track. But I am very anxious to force the Government to do what is right, not only with regard to Civil servants, but with regard to all others. We may be mistaken in our view of this amendment, but that is our object. Of course, if we could carry it, and put the Opposition in office, perhaps we should be able to do justice ; but we are not in a position to carry it, and the best we can do is to discuss the question and show where the Government are wrong. A good deal has been said about the Defence Force. The hon. member for Balonne made one interjection the other night that deserves attention on this question. He said that if we do away with the Defence Force we might call for tenders in the event of the colony being in danger. That is a very good suggestion. War machinery is being so improved that human beings are really being done away with in war, and we shall have syndicates taking up the busi­ness of settling the disputes between nations. I trust the hon. gentleman will use his full strength in assisting us to compel the Government to do away with the Defence Force; and when any terrible bloodthirsty individuals come along to attack us, we shall call for tenders to defend us. That would do away with many wars. With regard to the contracts with English officers, no one on this side wishes to break these con­tracts in a dishonourable manner; but when the engagements of .these officers expire we should dismiss them, and all the unnecessary expenditure

attached to the force can be then curtailed or done away with. The money thus saved could be devoted to the Education Department, where the expenditure is being cut down. At the present time there are thousands of men out of work, and children are being sent to school hungry; and yet these children are being sent home with instruc­tions that they are not to come back until they get various small sums for school requisite<;. The Government are .. doing a great injustice to our future population in retrenching the Educa­tion Department, when, by reducing the expen­diture in various ways on the Defence Force, that could be avoided.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: You will not wait until you hear what is proposed to be done.

Mr. REID : There have been so many things changed in the proposals made in the Financial Statement that it is difficult to know what is now proposed. One change, of which I am glad, has been made. As I am against the Govern­ment, and cannot be accnsed of wanting a seat on the Treasury benches, I can, without any fear, say that I do not think the Ministers ~tre overpaid, especially when we consider the salaries paid to the Railway Commissioners, the Auditor-General, and even the permanent heads of departments, and see that many of them, though in subordinate positions, receive larger salaries than the Ministers. If there is any dignity in con­nection with the position of a Minister of the Crown, a salary corresponding to the dignity of the position should be paid. I am not in favour of very high salaries, as I do not think any man worth more than £1,000 a year to any­body-not even a lawyer. The Government, by voluntarily giving up 10 per cent. of their official salaries, have made themselves rather popular; and their action has taken away the ground for a good deal of the "claptrap" the hon. member for Mackay referred to last night. I hope that those officials whose salaries are fixed by statute will be shamed into allowing a similar reduction i1l their salaries-from the judges downwards. That would not impair the efficiency of the judiciary, as the hon. ~em­ber for Carnarvon would have us believe. A great deal has been made on the other side about a land tax. The junior member for North Brisbane remarked that it would need a surgical operation to get the idea of a single tax out of the head of its advocates, and I agree with him. Although not a single taxer, I am a believer in a land tax. No one knows better than the hoi). mem­ber for North Brisbane the justice of such a tax. In view of the large amount of money we have spent in railway construction, the large endow­ments we have paid to divisional boards, this country should have a land tax at the earliest opportunity. Although the Government may shirk the position at present, things are tend­ing so that in the next Financial Statement I believe the Treasurer will be corn pelled to pro­pose a land tax, loth as he is to suggest it now. I very much prefer a land tax to an income tax, as we all know how the scoundrel is given a chance with the latter to put in a very low income, whilst the honest individual-if there is such a person about-puts in the full amount. I trust that the colony will be compelled, from its fallinl? revenue, to put on a land tax ; and we may then be recouped for the large amount we have spent on public works. In the end, the step the Governmmt have taken to reduce the endowment will be found to have done good. There is not the least doubt that many divisional boards will be compelled to retrench in regard to works; but in the end, in those districts where the people exercise control, and the management is not under a few squatters,

330 Supply. [ASSEMBLY.] Supply.

as in the back blocks, it will prove a boon. In the past the land tax has not been properly administered under our Local Government Acts, and I am sorry they are limited to rating pro­perty at 2d.

Mr. STEPHENS : There is no limit fixed in the Act.

Mr. REID : The Act limits the rate to 2d. in the £1. •

The SECRETARY FOR LANDS (Hon. A. H. Barlow): Look at the Valuation and Rating Act. You are all wrong; it is not limited.

Mr. REID: I donotdenythat special rates may be imposed. I would like the divisional boards compelled to get all their revenue from a land tax; and not only divisional boards, but the Govern­ment as well. When we do that we will have prosperity in Queensland. It will put down the fictitious land booms Lhat the hon. member for Nurth Brisbane has done so much to create, and instead of fictitious values we will arrive at a fair value. I am glad that the Government are taking away endowments to divisional boards, and forcing them to put on a stiffer land tax. A land tax, so far from hindering prosperity, will increase H ; and I think the junior member for North Brisbane will bear me out in that.

Mr. DALRYMPLE: They have got it in Egypt and India, and they are the poorest people in the world.

Mr. REID : And we will have it here before long. The Chief Secretary, in his speech the other night, made a remark which no hon. member has noticed. He said, if we redaced the men with £1,000 a year, men would be thrown on the labour market-that they would not be able to employ so much labour. That simply means that the people of the colony have to pay individuals £1,000 a year so that they may have an extra servant or two. \V e knnw that the more wealth is destroyed by the wealthy classes, the better it is for those who depend upon them; but I do not think the Government or people are going to stand such a flimsy argument as to say that we must pay Civil servants £1,000 a year simply that those gentlemen may have servants to wait upon them, and do work which they could do for themselves. I am glad that the Minbtry have decided to reduce their own salaries by 10 per cent. ; and if the ::.mendment has had no other effect, it has done that amount of good, because other people with high salaries may be induced to follow that example. I would like now to refer to the question of Hansard. I am sorry that the Government have stepped in and reduced Hansard to a weekly publication. A weekly Hansard is simply no good. People will not take it at the end of the week and settle down to read the speeches. I think the people take an interest in the daily Hansard, and more interest is being taken in it now than at any previous time. If that is so, it shows that the country is taking more interest in the affairs of this Chamber ; and I think when the people show a desire to read Hansard and study the way in which the affairs of the country are conducted, the Government would do wrong, for the sake of a paltry thousand or two, in making any alteration. I believe it is money well spent. It is like the educa· tion vote, for when the people read Hansard they get an impartial report of our speeches. I think Hansard should be left as it is ; and I trust the House will carry that again"t the Government, so that they win be compelled, on the Supplementary Estimates, to bring down enough money to carry on H ansa1·d as it has always been carried on. The hon. member for Warwick had a great deal to say about the

reporting staff; but I think if the composing staff were done away with, and tenders called for the printing of Hansard, it would be a very foolish way of doing business. We have got the machinery and the buildings, and we can get the type as cheaply as anyone. The Colonial Secretary will also bear me ant when I say that the labour for set­ting up Hansard can be got at the same price as that paid in other printing offices. It is set up by piecework; and if the men get paid a little more than current rates, it is all the better for them and for the Government. Considering the way the Hansard composing staff has been treated in the past, to throw them out on the street whole­sale now would be doing a great injustice. 'l'hey have in the past been taken on for the session, and they have been turned out when the session was o~er; and if they had not stopped in Brisbane, Hansard could not have been got out. Those men have been turned adrift every year, while other compositors in the office have been working overtime. I think the way in which the Hansa1·d composing staff has been treated for the last few years has been shameful, and I trust that a sympathetic and humane man, such as the Colonial Secretary is, will see that the matter is remedied. I wish now to make a slight correction, which I have promised an hon. member to do. The hon. member for South Brisbane, in speaking last night, referred to the hon. member for Lockyer as having referred to the Labour party as "the section in the corner." It was not the hon. member for Lockyer who made that statement, but the hem. member for Car­narvon. I said I would make that correction, because the hon. member for Lockyer has enough on his shoulders without being called upon to bear that weight. In the Financial Statement reference is made to the sugar industry, and the hon. member for Mackay also referred to it last night. That hon. member commenced to accuse us uf leaning too much against the State prop, and said the Government had taken into its hands to do a good many things which private industry should do. I do not doubt that, and if the Queensland Government bad not taken it into their hands to initiate a system of bringing slaves over to work on the sugar plantations, and so degrade the name of Queensland--

Mr. CHAT A vVA Y: I rise to a point of order. I would like to ask your ruling, Mr. Speaker, as to whether it is right for the hon. member to speak of action taken with the consent of this House as "bringing slaves over." There is an Act of Parliament which permits of Polynesian labour to be brought over here--

The SPEAKER: The hon. member is not in order, because he is casting imputations upon previous Parliaments.

HONOURABLE MEMBERS : Call them "free labourers."

Mr. REID : As the term " slaves" is ob­noxious to the hon. member for Mackay, and is considered an imputation upon past Parliaments, I bow to the Speaker's ruling, and will call them free labourers-black free labourers. If the Queensland Government had n:>t dragged the fair name of Queensland through the mud, and created such a stir against us by bringing over black free labourers, the sugar industry might not be leaning against the prop so much. Past Governments voted £25,000 for the North Eton Central Mill, and £2'5, 000 for the Racecourse Central Mill ; and considering- the amount of interest they have received from those mills--

Mr. CHAT AWAY : They have received full interest.

Mr. REID : Read the sugar report, and you will see the interest received. The hon. member for the sugar industry should not have accused us of leaning against the State prop when the

Supply. [2 At:GUST.] Supply. 331

industry he advocates so earnestly has re­ceived £50,000 by way of assistance. I do not think people lean too much against the State prop. I admit that the State prop at the present time has got white ants in it, as the member for Burke has said, and we should get rid of them with a tax they could not get through. I believe in the State assisting as many industries as possible in a proper, legitimate, and business sort of way, so that the State may receive something for money advanced. The hon. member for Mackay has stated that those engaged in the sugar industry are attempting to settle white farmers on a small acreage of land to carry on the industry. That is one way of settling the difficulty, and the hon. member can look to the Labour party to .assist in carrying out that much­needed reform. I trust the Government will see their way to dismiss as few Civil servants as possible. The Attorney-General stated that in future it would be better for the young people of this colony to be trained in self·reliance, if the lands of this colony are to be developed in a proper way. I agree with that; but in the past, as hon. members know, we have had the Civil Service overmanned, and hundreds of men have been thrown out of it, and men who have spent about half their lives in doing particular work in the Civil Service became useless for private employment. At the present time there are hundreds of capable men who may be called all-round men, fighting and cutting each other to get positions in private industries. Pri­vate industry does not require the services of dis­missed Civil servants brought up to a particular kind of work. There is no trade-not even that of the lawyers-in which there are not numbers of unemployed now, and even parsons seem to be getting about looking for work more than they used to. I trust that instead of throwing them out, as has been done in the past, the Govern­ment will see their way to find some early opportunity for reinstating Civil servants who have spent a long time in the service. It is a great injustice to men who have spent a long time in the service, and who are not required for private employment, to turn them out with nothing but starvation to face. They cannot go upon the land, because one·half of them are incapable of growing pumpkins. I trust the Government will consider their position, should things take a turn, and reinstate where they can, not only men discharged from the Civil Service, but also from the railway service. The railway employees who have been dismissed will be found better than new chums at the work, as they know the whole run of it, and the salaries now paid in the service are not so enticing as they were. If the Go­vernment will do their best for the discharged Civil servants, and try to reinstate them as early as possible, they will have the support of the Labour party in doing so.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: There is a good deal of consternation as to the effect of the proposed reductions ; but the Treasurer's Statement shows that the reductions will be explained at the proper time-when the Esti­mates come on for consideration in deta,il. I know, from experience in this House, that the wise rule which prevents a discussion of the Estimates in detail at this stage is always broken, and no doubt greater latitude has been given to hon. members on this occasion because of the number of new members in the House. I can safely say that hours of time· could have been saved if hon. members had waited until the Ministers in charge of particular departments had given their explanations of the Estimates connected with those departments. I have seen "Aunt Sally" after "Aunt Sally" set up uhat

would not have been mentioned if hon. members had heard a word of explanation from the Minister in charge of a particular estimate. I will speak first of the retrenchment propos<>ls. The hon. member for Enoggera finds a reduction in the Estimates of £300,000 under the sum set down for last year, and concludes that that is drawn from the Civil Service, when, if hon. members would go through the Estimates, they will find that the reduction in conneutiJn with the Civil Service does not amount to £100,000. There are many things which the Government have this year been able to cut off. The Govern­ment simply say they are able to economise by doing away with certain expenditure on last year, and that expenditure does not necessarily come in connection with the service. I will give hon. members an account of the system on which the Government have gone in con­sidering the question of retrenchment, and will take my own department as a sample. The first tbing I had to consider was, what was the desire, the direction, of the country in connection with this matter. In 1890 we had a very able Statement made, with which, to a certain extent, I thoroughly agree. I will read a few words from it to show that I had prominently before me the viAws which at that time animated the Government. The Statement is that of Mr. Donaldson, who was Colonial Treasurer in the GovArnment of which the hon. member for Balonne was Premier, and the present leader of the Opposition a member. He said-

" Surely no one would advocate reducing the salaries of the great majority of those people (the Civil servants), who, I contend, are not overpaid; and when the higher branches of the service are taken into consideration, it must be borne in mind that long training was neces~ sary to fit them for their positions, promotion comes slowly, and the better paid offices are only a fair reward for the meritorious." That was the issue placed there when the pro­perty tax was suggested. The Opposition, of which I was one at the time, stated that they coulrl not agree that there could not be retrench­ment made in the service. I spoke very strongly on the subject. After the new Government took office they, in conjunction with the Civil Service Board, made up their mind to pursue as far as possible, taking into consideration the views of their predecessors, what I call a tenevolent system of retrenchment. That was to do this : If the exigencies of the colony did not call for it immediately, we tried to allow the deaths, resig­nations, and departures from the service from other causes to relieve the congestion in the service, so that there might be no need to cast suddenly upon the world those who had been for a long time in the service. That has been the policy pursued for the last three years, silently and slowly, and it has had the effect of relieving some of the congestion without materially inter­fering with the number of persons in the service; and a sum of about £100,000 has been saved by the process. Recently, however, it became necessary for the Premier to put forth his policy to the country, and he went to the country upon the policy of retrenchment. The country has endorsed that policy, and has sent members here to carry it out. Every hon. member on this side is pledged to do the best he can-first, to lop off the salaries of those men wLom the Government can see their way to dispense with; and, secondly, to reduce those who are getting more than the fair salaries which the colony can afford to pay. In connection with my own department I never took into considera­tion one person whose salary was below £350 a year. I recognised that the salaries of some persons in the department were too high, and I began at the very top of the tree, and whenever I saw anything of the kind I brought those

332 Supply. [.A.SSEMBtY.j Supply.

highly-paid officers down to what I considered a fair and normal salary. Having done that, I began to look around to find where, by an amalgamation of offices, the services of officers could be dispensed with for a time only ; but there is not the slightest reason why those men should remain out of employment one hour longer than the condition of the country demands. I may state that since I have been a Minister there has not been one man admitted into the Civil Ser­vice from outside the service, with the exception of a dispenser at Dunwich, where the services of a specially qualified man were required, and a minor appointment in the law department, where also the work was special. My department, in conjunction with that of the Chief Secretary, over which I at present exercise considerable control, expends sor:1ething like .£500,000 a year, and not one farthmg has been taken off the salaries of those who get less than .£175 a year. The amendment of the leader of the Opposition says the House should refuse to consider the Estimates of the Government because in their proposals of retrenchment they have not put the burden on the right shoulders. I would like to know if any Minister could have done more fairly than I have in connection with my department. I may tell hon. members now, as I have stated before, that when I first went into the office I di,pensed with the services of a num­ber of men for a short time, anticipating that they would be on again before the end of the year. Long before that time every officer I retrenched was back, perhaps in lower positions, but entirely to their satisfaction. I have looked through the number of the dismissed officers, and I find that the number is greatly exaggerated, and that there are very few persons, in compari­son with what the public have been led to believp, whose services have been, even tempo­rarily, dispensed with at the present time. When the Estimates come on it will be found that m11ny things which have been stated in the Press and by hon. members are open to explanation. No doubt, for instance, hon. mem­bers will have seen a statement published in a paper last Saturday that I had done some fearful injustice to the detective service by reducing the long-service pay of the detectives. "What I did was ~o increase their s11laries last year by a very consrderable sum, and this year I had to make reductions wherever they were necessary. In the whole of my department I have only found it necessary to acknowledge the services of ten juniors, whose salaries were under £100 a year, who had distinguished themselves in their pro­fessional studies, and they were given an additional £10 a year as an encouragement to perseverance. That being so, what have we now before us in this House? ·we have a distinct issue. We promised the country at the general election that we would retrench, and any hon. member who knows what Ministers have been doing for the last three months should sympathise with them in the many calls that have been made upon them by those whom it is proposed to retrench. I have looked through the list of officers, and where I have found it necessary to retrench an office or a department, I have not necessarily placed the man in that office out in the cold. Other Ministers have done the same. \Ve have looked at merit and seniority, so that we might put a man in his place, and let the junior stand out until the time comes for him to go back to work. So far as the law is concerned, he iB uot badly treated. The Minister has given him two months' notice-that is, every man remains at the same salary for the months of .July and Augnst.

Mr. DRAKE : What about the 10 per cent. reduction?

The COLONIAL SECRETARY : That will he des.lt with when the Bill comes forward; it is not in the proposals now brought before the House by the Treasurer. Each of these men has a right, if he desires to leave the service, to one month's pay for every year's service allowed under the Act. So that no man leaves the service without having six months' notice at full pay, and men who have been ten years in the service will recei \'e twelve months' pay; they can demand it under the law. There has not· been that amount of hardship some hon. members seem to think. I cannot speak for departments managed by boards and the Railway Commissioners. Hints btve been thrown out that the Commissioners have done certain things ; but such matters do not come before Ministers. I do not know the particular men or officers. They are paid by the day, and do not appear in the Estimates. All Ministers have done has been to knock off men tern-· porarily. There is no doubt that wherE' six or seven men are operatin&" in different departments there may be inequalities, which could only be remedied by theCivilServiceBoarddoing its duty. But the Board, owing to the difficult task before them, and other reasons, have not carried out the duties that the House expected when they were appointed, and the consequence is that Ministers have been driven to it, and have done their best to do what mercantile persons would do-namely, to lop off the officers they could fairly dispense with.

An HoNOURABLE MEMBER: Why not lop off the Board?

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: The amend­ment invites hon. members to vote against the Government, because the burdens of retrench­ment have not been made to fall upon the right shoulders-because the Government have not got at the men on the schedules by an income tax. The Government have proceeded to retrench by dispensing with officers and reducing salaries, and an hon. member says we must have an income tax, because by no other means can we get at the highly-paid men in the schedules.

Mr. DRAKE: How can we oppose the pro­posed reductions withont voting for this amend­ment?

The COLONIAL SECRETARY : If the hon. member has sufficient power, there is such a thing as the Supplementary Estimate", and motions may be made that there be placed on the Supplementary Estimates a sum of .£100 for such and such a salary, which has been reduced by the Government.

Mr. DRAKE: How could snch a motion get through?

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: It could get through without any difficulty whatever. There have been so many minds operating on these different classes of Estimates that there are, no doubt, inequalitie•, which may be the subject of Supplementary Estimates. Of course the Government will assist the House, and the House is here to do justice to alL There may be some very high salaries which have been passed over. Hon. members have charged the Govern­ment with not having- touched the salaries of highly-paid officers; but they are quite mistaken. If they will look at list No. 1, they will find that, with the exception of the Under Secretary for \Vorks, who receives£500ayear, the UnderSecre­tary for .Justice, who receives £500 a year, and the Under Secretary for Mines, who receives .£750 a year, which he was receiving as warden at Gympie, all the other under secretaries are under the Act of 1863. If hon. members look at that Act they will see that these officers eau

Supply. [2 AUGUST.] Supply. 333

retire upon pensions, which the Government did not conoider it wise to compel them to do. I saw there were "ome highly-paid officers in my department, and, without mentioning names, I may instance one who receives £650 a year and quarters. I considered that too much ; but I found that officer was sixty-one years of age and doing good work. If I had retrenched him I should have had to engage another man at £500 a year, and the present occupant could bave retired, whether I liked it or not, upon a pension of £500. Therefore it was not economical for me to deal with oflicers under the 1863 Act. Under that Act the last three years' salary is the index of the pension. The contract is not determined by the whole term of service ; so that if Ministers had taken it upon themselves to reduce these officers, who had been paying nnder a superannuatiGn scheme, to earn a pension, fur a number of years, they would have done a gross act of injustice, for by the same rule they could reduce the salaries to nothing, and practically have made null the whole of the pensions under the Act of 1863. This all shows the wisdom of the rule that it is unwise for hon. members to make individual attacks upon Ministers in connection with their departments, because they will find very good reasons can be given for not touching some of the . higher salaries. In connection with Thursday Island, I may mention that we have not touched the salary of the Hon. John Douglas, but we have omitted his allowance of £200 a year. The travelling allowance of the Under Secretary for Agricul­ture has been reduced, and, in fact, in every instance where the Government could operate without doing an act of injustice and abrog~tting a contract made by our predecPssors, we have done so in connection with high salaries all through the Estimates. Take my own Esti­mates: I found that the courts of petty sessions cost £38,000 a year; but you will see that is down to £25,000 now,and yet I have left no officer there with less than £,150, and most of them receive £500. Still I have saved the colony som!J £10,000. The only under secretary whose salary has not been specially reduced is the Principal Under Secretary ; and anyone who thinks that officer does not render good work for the money he receives, littleaknows the value of that officer's services to the department. We have dispensed with the services of those who are not required ; we have done our best to cut down where emoluments were abnormal ; in addition to that we have brought the service into the state to which it ought to have been brought by the Civil Service Board. We have placed it on a fair footing, and now the Treasurer asks the House to agree to a 10 per cent. reduction on all salaries over £150.

The HoN. J. R. DICKSON: Does that refer to the retrenched salaries?

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: There is no retrenched salary.

Mr. POWERS: The schoolmasters say they are retrenched.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: So far they have not been retrenched. Their salaries on the Estimates are untouched. There is a reduction in the emoluments, and if the hon. member will wait till the Estimates are before us he will find in what respect. l have referred to the fact that there are some officers under contract whose ser­vices the Government would be glad to dispense with ; and I deplore the fact in connection with the Defence Force that we have bad to dispense with some officers whose services were highly prized. But I suppose they have made provision for a year or so, at any rate; and when

present contracts terminate there will be places for them again in the force. The feelings of Ministers have been wrought to the highest pitch for a long time by the numerous appeals to one and all by reason of the acts we have been compelled to do; but do it we must, or break our faith with tbe country and im­pose further taxation. We have carried out our promise to retrench ; and at the outset we are met with a vote of want of confidence, When I spuke before in favour of retrenchment I said I considered that an income tax was better than a property tax. I believe so still; but I believe the colony can get through its difficulties without further taxation. J n Victoria there is the greatest excitement over a proposition to establish an income tax, and the Labour members there are opposing the tax.

Mr. TURLEY: There are only about two. The COLONIAL SECRETARY : Here the

leader of the Opposition says, "Your proposals are not satisfactory, becau;,e you have not intro· duced an income tax."

An HoNOURABLE MEMBER: Because the burden does not fall on the right shoulders.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: No one has attempted to show how we can get at the gentlemen who are paid under Acts of Parlia­ment, except by an income tax ; and I ask any hon. member whether this is a time in the history of Queensland to introduce an income tax? \Ve have a dividend tax, which is clearly an income tax, and costs nothing to collect. An income tax would necessitate the crecttion of a new department, and there would be no result, so far as revenue is cm:cerned, for a period of two years. We should have to dispense with the dividend tax. \Ve could not work under the two systems, because the income from both sources would have to be obtained under one uniform system. The consequence would be that the persons we are most desirous of bringing to the colony-those who have money-will choose other fields for their investments when they find that there is an iacome tax here, while there is none in the other colonies.

Mr. POWERS : They are putting it on. The COLONIAL RECRETARY: They are

not. In South Australia and New Zealand­countries where the Labour party have had some say in the government-what has been the result of an income tax ?

Mr. ~DANIELS : Prosperity. The COLONIAL SECRETARY: In South

Australia the income tax department costs £10,000 a year to administer-leaving out of the question the initial cost, which was considerable­and the receipts from the tax are not £50,000. Our dividend tax is already bringing in £80,000, without any cost whatever.

The HoN. B. D. MOREHEAD : It is an unjust tax.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY : The leader of the Opposition has asked that we should establish a new department, in order to draw £4,000 or £5,000 from certain persons, and so drive away capital. l'i"o matter how the hon. gentleman may try and get away from that, that is the light in which the thinking men of this colony will view his proposal. The issue to them will be perfectly plain, and it is this : Are the people of Queensland prepared to agree to a scheme of retrenchment fur a time, whereby hardship may be inflicted upon a few individuals for the general benefit, or are they prepared to assist the leader of the Opposi­tion in bringing in an income tax solely for the purpose of reducing the salaries of those whose

334 Supply. [ASSEMBLY.J Supply.

salaries have been fixe(! by this House, and with whom we have made contracts? That would be doing a most dishonourable thing for the pur­pose of getting at a few people only; because the amount received from the outside public over and above the amount now contributed in the shape of the dividend tax would be little more than we would · get from these officers of the State appearing in the schedules ; and in order to get that small amount we are to be put to the expense of a new depart­ment. Nearly every hon. member is at present paying an income tax. I have an income out.ide my official salary, thank goodness! And I have to pay a considerable amount in· the form of a dividend tax. I feel the inequality of the imposi­tion as much as anyone, but I recognise that the exigencies of the State require it, although at the time the tax was first proposed I considered a general income tax would be better. The question of the collection of any tax has to be considered. We. wanted the money imme­diately, and the collection of the dividend tax has been made to put no burden on the State. The income tax in England was originated as a war tax, and when the time arrives we may put it on here, J.ut at present we want no further taxation. I wish to say a few words, particularly to hon. members of the Labour party, with reference to the incidence of taxation. Those hon. members are always harping upon the supposed 1mmense amount that the wage-earners contribute to the revenue through the Customs, and I think they thoroughly believe what they say. They simply take the total amount contributed, and divide that by the number of people in the colony, and fancy that represents the individual contri­bution. Now, in the year 1882, the late Sir Henry Atkinson, one of the ablest statisticians in Australasia, and one oft he most capable Premiers who ever held office in any of the colonies, took upon himself to find out what was con­tributed to the revenue of New Zealand by the various classes of people. At that time the popu­lation of New Zealand was 489,933, and the amount raised by taxation was £1,717,748. He excluded wines and spirits, foreign beer, and tobacco from his calculations, and I shall do the same. Going on the basis of hon. members opposite, the individual's share of the taxation was about £3 10s. per head. Everything that human ingenuity or experience could suggest was dune to secure accuracy in the calculations. The population was. divided into three classes -first, the wage-earning or industrial class, then the intermediate class, including those who did not belong to the industrial class, but who did not pay anything towards the property tax ; and the third class comprised those who contributed to the property tax. Under the last head came the holders of landed property. The property tax was M- in the £1, and was included in the revenue of £1,717,000. There were 312,436 in the industrial class, and their share of the taxation was 17s. 3d. per head. The intermediate class paid £2 13s. 3d., and the property class £6 Ss. 6d. per head. When hon. members prate about the amount contributed by the working classes they should remember that facts have shown that a man contributes in proportion to his wealth. If they go into the question closely they will find that the proportion borne by the wage-earning class in Queensland, compared with the amount borne by the property-owners, is in about the same ratio as in New Zealand. I qmte agree with those hon. members who con­tend that badly-adjusted taxation injures a nati0n, and that a well-adjusted tax will fall upon those best able to bear it.

Mr. DRAKE : Did that calculation only include the man himself, or did it include the members of his family as well ?

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: They were all counted. The hon. gentleman will find all the tables in the New Zealand Financial State­ment for 1882, and he will find evidence sufficient to satisfy him that the figures I have given are as fair a proportion as could be taken with the means at the command of any colony. I hope hon. m em hers will see that the issue of the amendment is that the House has no confidence in the Go>ern­ment, because their proposals do not include an income tax. The details of the Estimates are merely cobwebs around that, and can be explained when the Estimates are under discussion. The hon. member for Flinders, the other day, compared me to Bismarck-the highest compliment that could be paid to any man in Australia. He also stated yesterday-and I take the earliest opportunity of denying the statement-that, in my position as Colonial Secretary, I have always had what he calied a "down" on the members of the Labour party. I have looked upon the members of the Labour party as show­ing that there is a Labour party in the country. I have listened to the hon. member for Tovwong this afternoon and on many other occasions, believing that he i~ endeavouring to raise the 'class he represents m the social scale. I have always extended to such men that conrtesy which they have a right to expect; and I have never used my position to abuse or malign the Labour party ; but at the same time I have already recognised that outside the Labour party there are those stormy petrels of the labour disturbances, the agitators ; and although the same courtesy will be extended to the gentlemen opposite, in their representative capacity, yet, wittingly or unwittingly, they are the instru­ments of mischief, and in that respect I am not a sympathiser with them. I feel it necessary to say this, Ir.ore particularly because the leader of the Oppo•ition has taken upon himself to allude to me as prepared to follow the com­munistic flag. I heard the hon. member compared by the hon. member for J\!Iackay to a political chameleon; but to for one moment assert that I should follow under the communistic flag is rather ridiculous. It is true that I sat in the House at the time Sir Samuel Griffith brought forward a Bill called the Elementary Property Bill, and I certainly had the pleasure of seeing that measure relegated to the obscurity which it richly deserved. The only wonder I had was that such a large mind should evolve such little ideas; but because I happened to be associated with an hon. gentleman who, as a private member, introduced that measure, it is too absurd to say that I followed under the communistic flag. The leader of the Oppo­sition has entered on a new r&le in allowing the characters of public men or their private lives not to escape his traducing tongue. The hon. gentleman took upon himself to suggest that it would be wise of me to go to Russia and there found some sort of colony, knowing that he was the leader of that incongruous party oppo•ite who started the New Australia scheme; but when the hon. gentleman goes further and tells the House that the Secretary for Lands and I are political limJJets, sitting here for the sake of our salary, the hon. member should have, at any rate, a better record as far as regards political consistency before he makes such statements. I have never, during five years in this House, said one word as to the private life of any member of the House; but with regard to the political life of members who take upon themselves the r6le of censors, I feel there are occasions when I must use the old motto of a well-known statesman, or a gentleman who aspired to that position-" Nemo me impune lacessit."

Mr. REID : Give us the interpretation.

Supply. [2 AUGUST.J Supply. 335

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: That inter­preted, as a Scotchman would interpret it, is­" You must not sit down on a Scotch thiotle." I tell the hon. gentleman that in gratuitously select­ing me and the Secretary for Lands for such a public insult that, if he persists, he will have to deal with me. I know that Ministers have to have very thick hides. They have to accept a great deal, and I have done so for five years; but I do not feel inclined to accept the state­ment that I keep office for the sake of salary. I can fairly say, as far as the Secretary for Lands is concerned, that he was the last man to seek office with his tongue hanging out; and, as far as I am concerned, I have a profession and an income, which do not necessitate my hanging like a limpet to these benches. The hon. mem­ber, in speaking thus, not only speaks for himself, but of the party he leads. These statements go forth to the country, and to places where the hon. member's tergiversations are not so well known. They do not know how completely he has turned round and round.

Mr. POWERS: You cannot point it out.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: I can give the hon. member's political biography before his death. I can remember well when he came forth in the divisional board arena, where he acquitted himself so well as to gain the distinguishing sobriquet with which his christian name was then associated; and I remember when he struck out with a three-column advertisement of his political programme. .At that time I thought, " Here is a Liberal-I shall have a colleague who will assist me, if I get into the House, to carry on the Wide Bay business."

Mr. POWERS : I have stuck to that pro­gramme ever since.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY : The hon. member found it necessary, after sitting on the rail, to decide whether he was a Liberal or a Nationalist, and he immediately afterwards emerged as a full-blown Nationalist. We know full well what his career here has been. He brought forward certain measures of legal reform which went up like a rocket and ended in a fifth Catherine wheel on these benches. He after­wards was chosen as a member of a Ministry and acquitted himself most creditably; but ever since he ceased to occupy that position we have seen him go round and round in a circle. At one time he headed the black labour party, and assisted to prepare the resolu­tions in company with myself, and then we have him recently telling the Maryborough people that he had won over the hon. member for Toowoomba, Mr. Groom, and had succeeded in inducing him to consent to an extension of the Pacific Island labour traffic for seven years. The hon. member has invited me to the discus­sion of these little things. I know that in this House we have, and have always had, a Wide Bay party. At present we consist of eight, five members being on this side and three on the Opposition side. We have the hon. member himself and the hon. member for Burnett, whose sympathies are always with the Government, whose voice is seldom heard, and whose vote is always "agin the Government." We have also the young but erratic member for Gympie, the friend of the lady in high society, the gentleman who left the Defence Force and did not rise to the position of a major· general of the colony because some person would not allow him to take a glass of beer on the Sabbath. I am very glad to be able on this occasion to compliment the hon. member for Maryborough, as senior member of the \Vide Bay bunch, upon his appointment as leader of the Opposition. I feel somewhat like those

Parisians who go mourning about year after year over the loss of Alsace ; but I am not, like them, going to put a wreath of immortelles around the hon. member's brow. That may be done more appropriately by the senior member for Gympie and the hon. member for Burnett. When the hon. member insinuates that Ministers are desirous of sitting here for their salaries, he forgets that hon. members know the extraor­dinary efforts, including this one, he has made since he left the Government to get back to this position. By this resolution of want of con­fidence the hon. member expects, with the support of the Opposition, and reckoning upon dissent to the details of the Government pro­posals, to come back to these benches, which he insinuates Ministers are so anxious to retain.

An HoNOURABLE :MEMBER: It would be a good job for the country if he got there.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY : Possibly so. The hon. member, when he got back to his beloved Maryborough, made one of the most extraordinary statements, to the effect that mem­bers could not speak their minds because they were trammelled by banks and mortgagees. We have the hon. and g-allant member for Burrum here now, and the leader of the Opposition left his Bnrrum because the unfortunate banks and mortgagees conspired together to prevent in this House free discussion on the part of the hon. member. \Ve know that at Maryborough they had a triangular duel between the Liberal party, the Coalition party, and the Labour party.

An HONOURABLE MEMBER: He managed to get in.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY : He managed to get in by ousting the Labour mem­ber who put him in. \Ve know how the little game was played in the voting at Maryborough, and that, by the superior cleverness and adroit­ness of the hon. member, the man who lent him his votes to put him in was put out by his own action. I thought it necessary to refer to these little matters, as I am not going to allow members in their representative, not in their private capacity, to say that Ministers -myself and the Secretary for Lands being specially selected--occupy their positions in this House for the sake of the salary. For the last three or four years I have devoted my best atten­tion to the countrv at great personal sacrifice not only of my health but of my time; and the statement of the hon. member was as ungenerous to me as it was inaccurate. JI/Iany other matters have been re±erred to, but I shall only allude to one, and that is Hanf3ard. I can tell hon. mem­bers that Hansard caRts this country £8,000 a year, and my object is to save the country some of that expense. Arrang-ements will be made satisfactory to this Honse by which there will be as faithful and accurate a report of the pro­ceedings of the House as we have at present.

Mr. REID : Issued daily? The COLONIAL SECRETARY: The re­

port in Routh Australia at the present time is issued daily through the Press, and there is a weekly record. It has never been questioned by any member of the House.

Mr. MORGAN: Oh, yes! The COLONIAL SECRETARY: No; I

have it from the House itself and the persons contractirlg that there has never been one single appeal under the contract by the Speaker, who is the judg-e; and the whole of that, including relJort­ing and printing, is done for £1,200 a year, and done with satisfaction to members of the House. I have provided Estimates this time for some­where about £4,000 for the same service. When we go into the matter I shall formulate a scheme

336 Supply. [ASSEMBLY.] Supply.

which will ensure what members desire-that is, a proper report of their speeches-at a very much smaller cost than we have been paying. ·I have nothing more to say, except on the question of the prospecting vote. Hon. members imagine that the Government knocked off that vote, but it was not on last year's Estimates at all. For certain reasons it was put on the Supplementary Estimates to experiment with. The experiment has been tried, and has so far resulted in nothing, and it was not considered advisable in the present state of our finances to pursue experiments when we have our debts to pay. So far as regards the various departments, the Treasurer's Statement says that the reductions proposed have been made with due regard to the interests of the individuals and the State. We have endeavoured to temper the wind to the shorn lamb ; and when we go into the Estimates in committee, hon. members will be satisfied that, acting in unison, the members of the Government have carried out reductions as well as possible under the circumstances.

Mr. HARD ACRE: The amendment of the junior member for Maryborough seems to me an extremely wise one, and it will appeal not only to the intellect but to every feeling of right and humanity of members on the other side of the House. Before pa2.sing to serious criticism of the Financial Statement, I desire to pay a tribute of appreciation to the Treasurer for the manner in which he delivered it. I have listened to many Financial Statements from the gallery; but I listened to none with so much pleasure as to the present one. As a piece of literary composition, it is graceful and lucid; and, contrary to most Financial Statements, it did not leave us in a state of mental confusion and bewilderment in the mass of figures put before us. Nevertheless, I think there are, below the surface of the State­ment, many things which are lamentable indeed. The Statement, below the surface, discloses a record of suffering, of national injustice, of misgovernment, and of legislative incompetency such as can be scarcely equalled in any other Australasian colony. Thirty years ago this colony started on its career of self-government, favoured with the most marvellous natural re­sources. It had untold mineral treasures, a vast area of fertile soil, a splendid climate which can hardly be equalled in the world ; and the founders of the self -governing colony undoubtedly looked forward to its future as one of unbounded pros­perity. Certainly one would have thought, with the advantages it possessed, that it would never have arrived at the state of industrial depression, of almost national insolvency and ruin, which we witne•s at the present time. It appears to me that this is due largely to the past misgovernment and legislative incompetency of those who have been in power during the past years of the colony's his­tory. vVe have had such misgovernment as would make the very angels weep and the jackasses laugh if they could do so. This side of the House could not possibly do worse for the colony than has been done by those who for alrthese years have been occupying th0 Ministerial benches. I am not at all afraid of our being able to do very much better than the present Government intend to do. There is something undoubtedly wrong in our social and industrial condi­tion. We are here following in the footsteps of the other parts of the world, and bringing about the same destitution, poverty,· suffering, privation, and misery that exist there. Surely it should strike hon. members on the other side that they are mistaken in their generi11 measures of government, and that the Labour party may have some better idea of the under­lying principles which will bring prosperity to a nation than they ·themselves have.

According to the Statement there is a deficit of .£287,141, but that is by no means the real deficit, because there are Treasury bills to the amount of .£1,279,676. These bills are mentioned in the Financial Statement, but only for this occasion. After that the inclusion of these bills in the current revenue of the colony will be lost sight of, and in future years it will appea,r that we had only a small deficit. This is the heaven­born financial ability that is displayed on the other side. Even this is not the total amount of the deficit. We should have had a true state­ment; instead of merely book figures, and there ought to be considered the value of the land sold under the Special Sales of Land Act. In the year 1891-2 there was .£125,000received from the sale of the public estate, and included in the current revenue. In the following year land was sold to the value of £149,000, also included in the current revenue, and which made the deficit appear smaller than it is really. If we consider all these amounts, the true deficit is £1,840,717.

The COLONIAL TREASURER: Why do you call "stinking fish"?

Mr. HARD ACRE: The sooner we realise our difficulties the sooner we shall get out of them. Even now we have not come to the full extent of the deficit. There is an item which ought to have been included, but which has not been, in the Statement. If we turn to table K we will find that on the 1st July, 1892, there was a net liability of unexpended votes of .£267,509, and now we have a net liability of £314,697, or about .£47,000 more. It may be that this is money for which we have incurred no debt ; but, on the other hand, it may be money for which we have incurred a debt during the present year, and not paid off. If the la,tter is the case-and the figures seem to show that it is-it ought to have been included in this year's account as extra deficit, and my reason for saying so is that at the end of 1892 votes lapsed to the amount of .£130,303, whereas the estimate now is £100,000.

The COLONIAL TREASURER : Can't yeu make .£47,000 into .£252,000?

Mr. HARD ACRE: This is the Treasurer's own estimate, and I take it to be accurate. If not, it is like the Financial Statement in many other respects.

The COLONIAL TREASURER: I don't think the Statement refera to that at all.

Mr. HARD ACRE: It ought to h:we been included. I want to show exactly what was the deficit on last year's transactions, in order to prove the incompetency and misgovernment of past Ministries ; and it is often wise to rake up past history in order to use it as a lesson for the present, and enabl.e us to do better in future. Now, according to the Statement we have a public debt of .£30, 639,534. It is all very well to say, "Let future generations pay for the present"; we are paying now for incompetency in the vast.

The ATTORNEY-GENERAL: You advo­cated paper money.

Mr. HARDACRE : I am strongly against paper money unless founded upon a metallic currency. Nobody can accuse me of advocating an inconvertible paper currency. There have been sold 'l'reasury bills to the amount of £1,420,945 which slwuld be added to the pu blio debt, although it is not included in the loan account. There is another thing th•,t is not included in the Financial Statement, which, nevertheless, ought to be considered when we come to reckon the progress of the colony-namely, the amount of land that has

Supply. [2 AUGUST.] Supply. 337

been sold since the commencement of the colony. According to the Lands Department report we have received from land alienation nearly £7,000,000, and there is interest to be added to that. Do you think that land-owners give money without getting interest back again ? The people of the community have to pay the landowners interest upon the money they have given to the Treasury for this land.

Mr. MoMASTER: The land is here still. Mr. HARD ACRE: But somebody else has

got it, and you cannot use it without permission. You have to pay through the nose for it. \Ve not only have to pay interest to the land­owners, but we have to pay something like 600 per cent. for the money put into the Treasury for that land. If we include this amount, our actual debt would be £39,060,479. But even that is not all. \Ve have incurred a liability of interest to the amount of over £:l0,000,000. For the 1870 loan we have yet to pay £91,872; for the 1872 loan, £586,660; for the 1875 loan, £813,774; for the 1876 loan, £88,876 ; for the 1877 loan incurred by the present Premier we have yet to pay £629,280; for the 1878 loan, £5!J2,6!J4; for the 1879 loan, £1,365,440; for the 1881loan, £502,480; for the 1882loan, £1,268,880 ; for the 1883 loan, £1,726,800; for the 1884loan, £8,044,050; for the 1889 loan, .£1,142, 779; and for the bst loan we have to pay £3,291,030; making a total of £20,126,591. That ought to be considered in our estimate of the present financial position of the colony. It is true that we shall derive some revenue from the public expenditure of these loans; but up to the present we have not derived as much revenue as the annual interest. I have the present Premier as an authority for that. In his election address he pointed out that our borrowings amounted to over £30,000,000, and the annual interest to over £1,200,000; that most of the so-called repro­ductive works did not yield the interest on the cost of their construction, and that taxation had been made a burden too heavy to be borne.

The COLONIAL TREASURER: You want more.

Illr. HARDACRE: We want it on the right shoulders. It is not I who want taxation; it is the hon. gentleman who last spoke who wants more taxation on the persons who have been taxed too heavily in the past, and find it difficult to make a bare living.

The COLONIAL TREASURER: Who are they?

Mr. HARDACRE: The railway employees are some of them. Go ·where you will, you find industrial distress and misery. There are warehouses filled with goods which cannot be sold because the people have no purchasing power ; and you will find agricultural produce going to waste for want of remunerative markets.

An HONOURABLE MEMBER: Where ? Mr. HARD ACRE: On the Downs, especially

in the neighbourhood of \V m·wick ; and in other places you will find farm produce rotting while people in the towns cannot get enough to eat. Thirty years of government have brought us to this, and I think we could not find twelve men in Queen street who could do worse than past Governments have done for this colony. 'fhe Prl?mier disclaims any blame for this state of things, and points wi'th pride to the years when he waq in power, and says that in most of those years there wrts a surplus instead of a deficit. But his surpluses were manufactured in about the same way that our small deficit has been manufactured this year­simply by a transfer of book figures. In order to place the blame on the right shoulders, I intend to explain how the surpluses were manu·

1893-Y

factured, and show how much of the public debt, how much of the deficit, and how much o£ our taxation we owe to the present Premier. In 187!!, the first year he was in ofl:1ce, he says he reduced the deficit from £155,000 to £61,381; but a footnote shows that the reduction was principally due to the transfer of £129,821 from the rail way reserves fund to the consolidated revenue fund. In addition to that, there was the sum of £70,000 which should have gone into the reserve fund, but which was taken by the Treasurer for the current revenue; and in the course of his Financial Statement that year he explained how that was done. He said-

" The estimate of land revenue is, of course, very much enlarged by the proposed transference of rectaipts which have gone previously irto railway reserve.s account. The Government propose to rept=:al clauses 12 to 16 of the Western Railw:,y Act, and claudes 9 to 12 of the Railway Reserves Act of :::.876. The effect of this repeal will be to divert into consolldated revenue the proceeds of htnd sales in the reserves which otherwise would be credited to railway reserves account. The land revenue by auction sales on this basis I estimate for the coming year at £70,000."

If we take this into account, we find that there would have been a deficit that year instead of a surplus of £261,000. At the same time a new Divisional Boards Act was brought in, which threw upon the divisional boards the expenditure on a large number of public works which had previously been borne by the Centt·al Gov·ern­rnent. That is also an explanation why we had a smaller deficit that year than his predecessor had before. In 1880-81, when the hon. gentleman was still in office, there was, according to the tables, a surplus of £266,014; but if we deduct from that year the amount transferred from the railway reserves fund of £252,525, it leaves the small surplus of £13,499. \Ve have further to deduct a large amount received from land sales. I notice that during the whole period of the hon. gentleman's reign in office there have been abnormce~l sales of the public estate. In 1880 the amount realised was increased from £24,000 to £100,000. In 1881 it jumpad to £249,000, and in 1882 it was £137,000; in 1883, £126,000; and then, when SirS. W. Griffith took office, it sank to £75,000-so that it is no wonder the Premier always had a surplus. In 1889 there was a surplus, but no extraordinary genius was mani· fested in bringing it about. There was a small surplus of £116,846, the extra Customs taxation amounting to £288,000; and there were also extra land sales, again, amounting to £66,000. The real deficit was £238,000. In 1891 we have a deficit of £334,000, and then we had the imposition of the dividend tB,x in that year, giving a revenue of £30,000. In 1891-2 the deficit was £115,000, the dividend tax realising £62,000, and the special sales of land £125,000. It is easy to get surpluses or to prevent deficits if you take the money out of the pockets of the people, which the Premier has always done when in office. I think, thereforG, that the leader of the Opposition was perfectly right in throw­ing the onus of our present position largely upon the present Premier. \V e owe to the hon. gentleman a legacy of public debt amounting to over £12,000,000. In 1879, when the hon. gentleman was in power, we had a loan of £3,053,000, and on that loan we lost £211,971. In 1881 we had a loan of £1,054,787. In1882 we had a loan of £2,643,500. In 1889 we had a loan of £1,554,834. In 1890 there were two loans rai9ed of £2,522,400 and £1,182,400 ; and the total losB upon loans was £745,000. \Ve pay upon loans incurred through the Premier an annual interest charge of £455,000, which has to come out of the pockets of the people, and which has largely increased the intensity of the industrial distress.

338 Supply. [ASSEMBLY.] Supply.

Mr. KINGSBURY: To give employment for labour.

Mr. HARD ACRE : I wish J:t.OW to show the amount of taxation the hon. ·gentleman has imposed upon the people. In 1889, immediately after his return, and in spite of the public pledges he gave, he brought in an increased Customs tariff, bringing in £28tl, 981. In 1889, 1890, and 1891 we had also the same tariff in operation ; and in the last-mentioned year the dividend tax was imposgd, from which we realised £32,735. In 1892 the tariff was increased, the revenue from which I estimate at something like £100,000.

The COLONIAL TREASURER : I wish it had realised that amount.

Mr. HARD ACRE : If it did not bring in that sum, it had the same effect upon the people, because it lessened the amount of production, and prevented the people purchasing things which they otherwise would have bought. We have not to estimate always the ill effects of taxation upon the people by the amount it bas brought into tbe Treasury. It sometimes bas the effect of taking a very large amount out of their pockets above the Treasury receipts, and it certainly has the effect of injuring the industries of the country, even though it may bring nothing into the Treasury. A fair estimate of the taxa­tion borne by the people during the last five years through the action of the Premier is no less a sum than .£1,810,000. There has been an amount of incompetency on the other side equal to, if not greater than, what was stated by the leader of the Opposition; and it certainly would justify any bon. member in voting for this vote of want of confidence against the present Govern­ment, because I hold that they, to a great extent, are responsible, as they are about to proceed upon the same lines as their predecessors, and place taxation upon the wrong shoulders. They are going to make those least able to bear it pay the most, and those most able to bear it, and who havP. been specially benefited by the public expenditure, are to pay the least. The Financial Statement discloses also, in addition to evidences of incompetency, a record of national injustice and social wrong. I believe that one of the reasons of our present financial condition and industrial depression is that we have neglected the laws of righteousness.

The ATTORNEY-GENERAL: Hear, hear! Strikes and burning sheds.

Mr. McDONALD: What about the Robb arbitration case ?

Mr. HARDACRE: We have lost, as a nation, that righteousness that should exalt and establish a nation, and it is not the workers who have done that, but the classes whom hon. mem­bers opposite represent. Our laws have been unjust ; the rich have oppressed the poor, and the strong have oppressed the weak. We have, under the guise of law and order, permitted those who do not work to rob those who do work of the fruits of their honest toil.

The SECRETARY l<'OR MINES (Hon. R. Philp) : How much have you lost?

Mr. HARD ACRE: I have lost a great deal which I ought to have had, and which I have not received. Outside this House we have had persons going to church and worshipping with lip service on Sunday, and on Monday they come out and rob their neighbour; that is a burning truth. Whenever a nation has lost righteousness, that nation has been ruined. \Vhenever the ruling classes have done what the ruling classes are doing now in this colony, nations have lost their wealth, their influence, and their civilisation. Our merchants, instead

of following the path of honest industry, have gambled in land, gambled in scrip, and gambled in wild-cat mines. We are told "ome­times that it is the Labour party that has frightened away capital ; but it is more likely those persons who have gambled in wild-cat mines who have deceived the English public, and no wonder people get frightened to invest their capital in the colony. The proposals of the Government at the present time do not intend to rectify the wrong under which we have suffered. They intend rather to continue them by placing all the burden on the shoulders of those least able to bear it. One of the complaints previous to the French Revolution was that the tax-gatherers passed by the palaces of the rich and rifled the cottages of the poor ; and that is what it is proposed to do in this colony. Whether you call it taxation or retrench­ment, the effect is the same, One of the Premier's election pledges was that there should be no taxation ; but he meant that there should be no taxation for the rich. He did not say there should be no taxation for the poor, and the present re­trenchment proposals undoubtedly are taxation of the poor under a different name. What do we care about names? The essential point is, Will it take from a man something more than it previously did ? And it certainly will. In some instances the Government are going to deduct 40 per cent. and 60 per cent. from the smaller salaries. The Colonial Secretary to-night told us that the Government proposed a benevolent system of retrenchment, and had taken nothing from those receiving less than a fair salary. I do not know whether his department has suf. fered less than others, but I know that men whose earnings were previously so small that they could barely get the necessaries of existence have had 40 per cent. and 60 per cent. knocked off their salaries. I am speaking of the rail­way employees-the lengthsmen, fettlers, and gangers, and other labourers on the Central rail­way line. They have been in many cases reduced 1s. and ls. 6d. a day; ls. 6d. per day on .£2 2s. a week is 40 percent., and that is a very muchlar!Ser deduction than is taken from the large salaries. It will be far more severely felt than a reduction npon higher incomes would be felt. We have been told it would be a breach of contract to interfere with the schedule salaries, and we must not break our agreements. Hon. members forget that we have made almost the same agreement with our railway employees. They have been engaged on the understanding that for the first year they would get so much, for the second so much more, and so on. lYiany of them have served anum­ber of years, and now, when the year comes for them to receive a stated amount agreed upon, they find they are to get a very much smaller sum. I hold it is as dishonourable to break faith with these poorly-paid men as with those receiving high salaries. It is repudiation. I am one of those who have asserted during· this debate that there is no necessity for retrench­ment, and I assert it again. I believe it is advisable in some cases on principle, but not for the purpose of making our finances meet. \V e know there have been many abuses in the service, and that many persons have been receiving large salaries for doing nothing or nearly nothing. They have had offices of sinecure, and in some cases they have held three or four offices, with large salaries for each, when one ordinary man could have done the whole of their work with­out feeling tired. It is only in cases where men are getting something for nothing that I hold retrenchment to be advisable. When con­testing my electorate I gave my constituents distinctly to understand that I would not vote for such retrenchment as I anticipated from the Mcilwraith Government. If we go back to find

8uppl;y. [2 AUGUST.] Supply. 339

what is the big item of our expenses, we shall find it is the annual charge for interest upon our public loans. Every year our annual interest charge has grown greater, with a constantly in­creasing difficulty in making our finances meet. At the present time we pay in annual interest nearly £1,250,000. That is sent away to foreign money-lenders, and accounts to some extent for our excess of exports over imports, because we are constantly sending away the products of the colony to pay foreign loan-mongers. If we look back we will also find that this increasing charge for interest has been met by an increasing burden of taxation upon the poorer classes of the people. In 1884 our annual income from Customs taxation was only £866,000, and to-clay our income from that source is £1,103,000, An increase in the annual interest charge has been followed by an increase in our Customs revenue, and the people have been called upon to pay taxation upon the articles they use to meet the interest on the money we have borrowed. The question is: Who ought to be called upon to pay this constantly increasing charge for interest? The Colonial Secretary placed the issue very fairly before us when he said it was either to be retrenchment or direct taxation-retrenchment which has fallen upon those least able to bear it, or direct taxation upon the richer classes, who are best able to bear it, and who should be called upon to bear it, as they have received most benetit from the public expenditure.

An HONOURABLE MEMBER : He did not say that.

Mr. HARD ACRE: ·No; but I say it for him. That is the clear issue-retrenchment, or direct taxation. If they do not propose to place taxation upon the richer classes, the only alternative is to place it upon the pourer classes. Now, who has received the benefit? I say that those who have received almost the whole of the benefit are the landowners of this colony. Every railway we have made and every road we have made has enhanced the value of the land. Every increase of population we have had at the public expense has also increased the value of land. Every advance and progress we have made has ultimately been abaorbed by the constantly increasing value of land, and that has gone into the pockets of the landowners.

The COLONIAL TREASURER: The land has not constantly mcreased in value.

Mr. HARD ACRE: I admit that the value of land, like the value of Mount M organ shares, has fluctuated at times, but at the present time the value of land is largely in excess of what it was at the commencement of the colony, and that increase in value is due solely to the public expenditure of the colony and the industry of the people. I desire to strengthen my position by references to authorities who ca-nnot be regarded as men who have not studied the subject.

Mr. KINGSBURY: John Stuart Mill. Mr. HARDACRE: Adam Smith and John

Stuart Mill, the political economist who is always in favour of the capitalist class. Adam Smith, the author of one of the "hundred books of the world," .and one of the greatest thinkers who ever lived, said-and the principle has been strengthened very much since his time-that every improvement in the circumstances of society tends, either directly or indirectly, to raise the rental value of land, and increases the power of wealthy landlords to purchase the labour, or the produce of the labour, of other people. The junior member for North Bris­bane, it may be, has not quite the capacious intellect of Aclam Smith; nevertheless, as a humble authority who may have some weight

with the House, I will quote a short passage from his speech at a public meeting at which he was displayin~ his versatility. The hon. mem­ber \vas referring to the results of protection in England, and he said protection was supposed to benefit labour and raise wages ; but it had effedecl neither. It had created an artificial demand for land suited to the protected trades, for which the price or the rent had risel:l rapidly, thus showing that the result of protection was absorbed by rent. If there was any advantage, it immediately went into the pockets of the land­lords.

Mr. AGNE\V: He is going to contradict that at the next meeting.

Mr. HARDACRE: I will give another illus­tration of the principle that land values con­stantly tend to absorb the results of public expenditure and public progress.

The COLONIAL TREASUv..£ER : In a ccn· gested country. ..,

Mr. HARDACRE : In all countries. The land in any country is limited, and the really good land is more especially limited. There is only a limited number of Queen-street allot­ments, and, in consequence of that, they possess a special value. In a town in England there was a philanthropist who took pity upon the inhabitants of a certain street in consequence of their poverty, and he left them, as a legacy, a certain amount of money to provide for them a loaf each clay. The result of that was that, by-and-by, there became a demand by the poorer classes to live in that street for the purpose of getting the loaf ; the demand for houses enabled the landlord to raise the rent, until the extra rent more than covered the cost of the loaves. Every public expenditure in Queensland has had that result. In Victoria the position is very similar to what it is here.

An HoNOURABLE ME;)!BER: Ten times worse. Mr. HARD ACRE: At any rate, they are

considering the same sort of Financial Statement, and I will read an extract from the Age whic)l thoroughly be;,rs out my argument, and every word of which is true of Queensland at the present time. [The hon. member read extracts from the article, which recommended that im­proved land values should be taxed, on the ground that they had greatly benefited from public expen­diture. Past taxation had been inequitable, in"' far as it bad struck the masses and not the classes.] To sho" the extent to which land-holders have benefited by the public expenditure, I have an account of the first land sale held in Brisbane, which is contained in the "Genesis of Queens· land." It says that a land sale was held on 16th July, ] 842, and the results exceeded the most sanguine expectations. Eight allotments in Queen street brought, together, £1,340, and the largest sum paid for any one was £250. The allotments on the south side did not go off so well, but the bidding was strong, the upset price being £100 per acre. The site of the Longreach Hotel was sold for £230. Another sale took place in 1846, when the site of Stewart and Hemmant's premises, 36 perches, was sold for .£22 10s.; and that of the Imperial Hotel, 36 perches, brought the same figure. The site of D. L. Brown's premises in Eagie street, 20 perches, was sold for £30 ; and three allotments, between the town hall and the corner of Albert street, realised £279.

Mr. McMASTER : That block was not sold then.

Mr. HARDACRE: My authority is the B1·isbane Courier, and I prefer to take its state­ment to that of the hon. member. The Brisbane Oou1·ier was a little more honourable then than at present. The site of the British India Company's

340 Supply. [ASSEMBLY.] Supply.

offices was sold for from 14s. to 16s. per perch. I have given quite enough instances to enable hon. members to compareC'the past with the present land values. Allotments worth £22 10s. each then are worth £500 per foot frontage now, and an acre of land in Queen street is worth from £500,000 to £1,000,000. I dare say the total value of Queen street-both sides-is not less than .£10,000,000. It has been said that these people purchased the land, but that does not concern my argument at all, because I am not so much speaking of the increased value as of the revenue which is being derived from those lands at the public expense. No amount of purchasing can give the rightful ownership in wrong interests. The same argu­ment was raised at the time of the anti-slavery movement in America. If a man purchased a slave, he was the rightful owner, and it was wrong for the &tvu;;" to run a way. If a thing is wrong, no amottilt of purchasing can make it right.

The ATTORNEY-GENERAL: They offered compensation.

Mr. HARD ACRE: If a slave had run aw~J.y, would the hon. gentleman say that the slave was defrauding his owner? If I had a horse, and someone else found it and sold it, I should still be the owner of that horse. These rents of Brisbane lands are derived by the owners, not because of what happened in the past, but because of the expenditure of public money, the interest on which we are called upon to pay. It comes out of the current products of the colony. Rent is not a product of the past; it arises day by day, and comes out of the pockets of the working classes.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: You re­pudiate the acts of past Parliaments in selling these landR.

Mr. HARD ACRE: I repudiate anything that is wrong in itself, and until we get rid of the speciouR plea of "law and order" we shall never bring about prosperity.

The SECRETARY FOR LANDS: "Cursed is he that removeth his neighbour's land-mark."-

Mr. HARD ACRE: The landowners of this colony have removed people's land-marks. In many cases they have dummied the lands, and have not paid for them at all. That which rightfully belongs to the people has been mono­polised by a few. It is immaterial whether the land was sold or not ; the revenues are ours, because they are produced by our expenditure and industry. Everything I purchase in Queen street I have to pay rent upon. The owners of Queen street are receiving, as a monopoly, rent which is extracted from the pockets of the people.

Mr. STEP HENS : The rent does not pay interest on the buildings.

, Mr. HARDACRE : I am speaking of the land. Interest upon buildings is all right; I believe in remuneration for industry. To­day the value of the alienated land of Queens­land, according to- the valuatiuns under the Valuation and Rating Act, is £40,182,000, and all we have received from the landowners is a little less than £7,000,000. Before passing from this subject, I wish to give one more extract from Pro­fessor Cairns, who sums up in one chapter what has been stated by almost every political econo­mist of note on political economy inland. He points out the distinction between revenue derived from the ownership of land and revenue derived from the products of industry-from real capital. [The hon. member here read the extract.] When we consider that a great amount of our present industrial depression and financial difficulty is owing to the iniquitous .£10, 000,000 loan and other

loans, and that our annual deficit on account of railways is about £250,000, and that these rail­Wl1ys have increased the v:1lue of the alien:1 ted land of the colony, we ought, in justice, and as a matter of humanity to those people who ha.ve been retrenched, to call upon those landowners to con­tribute more than they do to the national revenue. This tax is not a tax except in name, and so far from injuring the industries of the colony it would be one of the best means of bringing about prosperity, bec:1use it would have the effect of compelling persons who hold land for specula­tive purposes to put it into the market and let it get into the hands of people who will use it for productive purposes. I think it might be done in such a way that even the landowners them­selves would not feel it, and I will offer a sugges­tion, which, I may s:1y, is original. Sir S. W. Griffith proposed to exempt the first £,~00, and that is one of the good ways of imposing a land tax ; but I would like to see it progressive. I would make it :j:d. for the first £500, ~d. for the first .£5,000, and ld. for the first .£10,000. In :1ddition to that, there should be included all the mortgagees who have lent money on land. They should be made part owners, bec:1use in many cases the mortgagor is only the owner in name. We know that in buying land :1 person very often pays a small depoait and gets a sort of transfer. He then obtains a mortgage over the laud, and though he is the owner in name, the real owner is the mort­gagee. :Many of our farmers who are the regis­tered owners of land ::~re not the actual owners ; they are simply men in charge of farms on which they are paying burdensome rent in the shape of interest to the mortgagee. In order to ameliorate the severity of such a proposition, I would enable landowners to hand over land to the State for any useful purpose, and exempt them from· the tax for a certain number of , years. In assessing the V:J,lue for taxation purposes I would deduct :1n amount equal to the value of the improvements. If a piece of land was valued at .£1,000, and had a building on it worth £500, I would deduct .£500 from the .£1,000, and only tax the £500. That is one source from which we might obtain revenue, and in that way it would be obtained from people able to bear taxation. But there is another source which has been over­looked, or conveniently omitted, by the Ministry, and that is the rents from onr public unalienated estate. "What has been said of alienated !:1nd applies with equal force to land which is at pre­sent in the hands of men who pay very much less than they should pay for it. We are receiving only £340,000 from the 459,000 square miles which are in the hands of pastoralists. Some ten years ago it was urged that the pastoral rents shonld be increased, and it is safe to s:1y that the Courier would not be too severe upon the pastoralists. Yet, in Ma.y, 1883, the Courier commented upon the ridicu­lously insignificant rents which were being paid, and :1d vacated an increase. That was before the Land Act of 1884 was passed, and since that time we have borrowed £16,000,000 or £17,000,000, the expenditure of which h:1s still further enh:1nced the value of these lands. Yet the rents have been increased scarcely at all since that time, and I am jnBtified in caliing the attention of the Government to the 1·eport of the Lands Depart­ment of last year, where it is pointed out thitt it had always been understood by the department that one of the special objects of the Act of 1884 was to augment the land revenue by increasing the pastoral rents, and lead to increased settlement upon the land. Yet, though the Act had been in force for eight years, there had been a very small increase, and the, Under Secretary submitted that he was justified in drawing attention to the fact that some

S.upply. [2 AUGUST.] Supply. .341

amendment in our land laws is necessary. I hope that the Government will follow the advice of the head of the department. The inadequacy of the revenue is still more striking when compared with the rent derived from pastoral lands in New South ·wales. The area under pastoral occupation in New South Wales is only 132,000,000 acres-about one-third the area in Qlleensland-and yet the revenue i•1 about three times what we receive-£828,000. At the general election there \Vas some difference of opinion as to the actual val ne of our pastoral lands. I stated then that its value was at least 2s. 6d. an acre ; but the Government iboUed a map placing the value at 6s. 8d. an acre.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: They did nochin~; of the kind.

Mr. HARD ACRE: I am quite aware they did not do anything of the kind themselves­that was one of the deceptions of politics. They issued the map, and the Courier published the statements, and, of course, freed the Government from the respon0ibility. If the capital value of our land is anything like 6s. 8d. an acre, we should get sixteen times the amount of revenue we now receive. The average rent is about :id. an acre, which is 5 per cent. on a capital value of 5d. Even accepting my valua­tion of 2s. 6d. an acre, we should receive six times our present revenue, which would give us nearly .£2,000,000 more than we now receive. But even taking it at a discount on that value, we should receive an additional revenue of .£340,000 at least, which would utterly do away with all need for this severe and cr.nel retrenchment.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY : That land is all under lease; you cannot alter the rents this year.

Mr. HARD ACRE: We can do lots of things if we try. The I,and Board is entirely under tlie control of the Government, and they can recom­mend an increase if they choose; and even if this plan is not adopted, a nominal tax can be imposed, which would be equivalent to additional rent. In the Financial Statement the Treasurer fore­shadowed the sale of land for ten years, as one means of bringing ns out of our difficulties, just as land has been sold under che Special Sales of Land Act during the last two years. In the past, these sales have taken place in the Central dis­trict, and if the Government carry out their proposal, I hnpe they will not continue to despoil the Central division, and make that district pay off deficits incurred by the expen­diture of public money in the South. That is one of the greatest grievances of the people of Central Queensland. I have seen miles and miles of the finest land ili. the world-magni­ficent, deep, black soil country-sold to a single sq natter for lOs. an acre; and if the same plan is continued, the deficit will be wiped out, no doubt; but Central Queensland will also be wiperl out.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: Surely that is better than the 2s. 6d. an acre you pro­pose?

Mr. HARDACRE : That land is the pick of the lands in the colony, and might have b<;~en devoted to settlement, but it now lies idle, waiting for the unearned increment. So far as we are concerned, it is practically outside the colony. We can make no use of it except by permission of the owner, who has usurped the func­tions of Gove~nment. We have simply adopted the worn-out system of farming out taxation. ]:<'or a certain sum of money we have given to some men the right of levying 11 tax upon the people. That is precisely what we do when we sell land. A man gives us .£1 per acre, and by his title deeds he has the power to levy taxes; as we cannot

help using land, he has a special power of taxing us. I want those who go f!1>rming to be able to get land on which they can make a living, be­cause at the present time the farmers are forced either on to poor land er into inaccessible places. All our resources have been handed over to monopolists-all our best mineral land and our best agricultural land-and if we had kept them in the hands of the Government we should have had no deficit to-day. Why, the revenue derived from 11onnt J\!Iorgan alone would pay interest on the public debt, and the revenue derived from a fair rent on our alien­ated land would relieve the people of all taxation, and we could have onr railways, telegraphs, and post offices free. Instead of having 400,000 people in the colony we might have 40,000,000. The landlord is the enemy not on] y of the working classes but of the capitalist, because every £1 of rent he receives h6 gets from the pockets of both worker and capitalist. When a factory site is W!Lnted, and £1,000 paid for it, it all comes out of the remunerativeness of the industry. The revenue we derive to-day, whilst very much too small from our pastoral land, is too large from the agricultural land, and the effect of charging a large rent for the land is to prevent settlement. I hope this vote of want of of confidence will be carried. Unfortunately, I am afrai<l it will not be; but I cannot under­stand those members from our side who say they have no wish to oust the Government from office. \Vithout_hp,ving any personal bitterness towards members of the Government, I would only be too glad to see such a result come about, because I am convinced that the policy of the Government cannot bring about prosperity to the colony. The tax-gatherer will, in the future as in the past, so long as this Government is in office, pass by the palaces of the rich and rifle the cottages of the poor. I believe, in the words of one of America's greatest poets-" 'l'he time is ripe, is rotten ripe, for change ; Rt:n.son and government, like two broad seas, Yearn for each other, with outstretched hand~, Across the narrow isthmus of the throne, And roll their white surf higher every day.

"O~e ag~ mo~es o~wa;d, a1~d th~ ne~t builds ~p Cities and gorgeous palaces where stood The rude log huts of those first settlers who tamed the

wild, And reared from out the forests they had felled 'rhe goodly framework of a fairer state. He who would be truly great must understand His own age and the next, and make the present ready

to fulfil Its prophecy, and with the future merge Peacefully, as wave with wave."

As far as my observation goes, there is no person on the Ministerial benches who can put this colony on the high road to prosperity, and make it what its great resources entitle it to be. Therefore, I have no confidence in the Govern­ment's control, and no faith in the chance of their brin(l'ing about the conditions that ought to prevail m a colony like this. I shall therefore vote for the amendment of the leader of the Opposition.

Mr. CALLAN: I have no doubt after the speech we have just heard the. House will be quite .Prepared for a division. In my four years' expenence of this House I have never listened to a speech so bristling with figures. I could not grasp the meaning of one-half of what the hon. member e::ticl; but I came to the conclusion that he did not own any allotments in Queen street. I regret that the leader of the Opposition moved this amendment, because it, to a certain extent, stops members from giving as full expression to their views as they might otherwise have done. I have no intention of supporting the amendment, because I do not at the present time wish to

342 Suppl!J. [ASSEMBLY.] Suppl!J.

dispossess gentlemen on the other side. My prin­ci poJ reason is that the matter I am most interested in is the question of separation of Central Queensland, and I believe that question will be further advanced by our arguing the question from the Opposition side of the House than from the Government side. As to the Ministerial programme, we all know that retrenchment is absolutely necessary, and that it should have been begun long ago. I have possibly as great a stake in the country as any member of the House, and, having given the matter the utmost considera· tion, I say it ·is possible that in twelve months' time, so far from increasing salaries, we may have to go in for further retrenchment. I know it must have been painfal to Ministers to do this kind of thing. I and other members of the House have been besieged with telegrams and letters and conversations from men who are to be reduced or dismissed, or from their friends. It is a most painful thing; but it had to be faced, and it h well it has been faced. There is no use in say­ing that this or that man should have been kept on. I give the Government credit for having done the · best they possibly could, and with the least possible injury to individuals. Some hon. members have arlvocated an income tax, and I would not have the least objection to it; but in a young country like this-where incomes fluctuate so much, and where a man may make a large income one year and not a third or a fourth of it the next year-I do not see how it is possible for a Colonial Treasurer to estimate its results. I be­lie,·e thoroughly in education, but I agree with the reduction in the vote, as in these times I think all the colonies are spending too much upon education. In Victoria the leading men have spoken strongly against the education vote; and our vote is not devoted to the lower branches of education, but a lot of money is spent upon outside subjects.· As to Hansard, I have always. been opposed to it, and I am glad to see the £10,000 it has previously cost reduced to .£4,000. The business will go on better if the extent of Hantard is reduced. I am glad to see Ministers have consented to reduce their own salaries by 10 per cent., and, without further detaining the Housf', I may s~ty I cannot support the amend­ment of the hon. member for Maryborough.

Mr. BURNS : After the exhaustive and ex­hausting speech ofthehon. member for Leichhardt, the House will probably not look for any more long ·speeches, and in common mercy I will not inflict a great deal upon hon. members. I had a cer­tain sympathy with the amendment when I saw it first, as I thought it was intended merely to promote discus~ion upon the Treasurer's pro­posals ; but since it has been explained that it is m~ant as a vote of want of confidence in the Government, I have not the slightest sym­pathy with it. I am glad the discussion has taken place for one thing, and that is; that it has proved to me that Hansard, to he a verbatim report of all that is said in the House, is surely not necessary, and it would be an in­fliction upon anybody to have to read it through. Like many more in the House, I "feel extremely sorry for those poor fellows who are to be re­trenched, and eRpecially for those who are to be dismissed altogether; but I recognise that a saving somewhere or another must be made, and that cannot be done without someone having to suffer. The whole matter has been clearly ex­plained by Ministers who ·have spoken, and I thought after their addresses there would be little more to be said, but member after member has oince got up and repeated and reiterated what we have heard until it ha> become perfect nausea to us. After an objection has been two or three times clearly expressed, I should have thought that would be considered enough, instead of wasting three days in saying the same thing. I am

pledged to retrenchment ; during my election tour I advocated it, and that it should commence at the right end. By that I explained that I meant at the larger salaries that could best afford it. I had a certain feeling of disappointment when I found that in the Estimates put before us it appeared that the poorer men were to be the greatest sufferers. It has since been clearly explained by the Attorney-General and the Colonial Secretary that the higher salaries could not be reduced without breaking faith or without being dishonourable. A bargain is a bar· gain, and I would not advocate doing anything unjust or unfair; and if hon. members can show, as has been said, that a bargain has been made with some of the smaller men whose salaries are to be reduced, I, for one, will support them in seeing that that bargain is not broken. I have heard some extraordinary things said during- the debate, and the hon. member for Enoggera argued that it was not neces­sary there should be any connection between revenue and expenditure, so far as govern­ment is concerned. The hon. member said that, though revenue has fallen off, there should be neither reductions nor dismissals in the service. That was something new to me, and I thought it too good to be true. The Government are like private individuals or firms, and muRt cut their garment according to their cloth. There is an old Scoth saying : " It's ill baking cakes wan tin' meal," and though the Treasurer's State­ment may not be a full-sized, ample, satisfying cake, considering the shortness of meal, he has made a very creditable cake. I have sufficient faith in the good-heartedness and integrity of mem hers of the Government to believe they would not wantonly injure anyone, or be severe where severity might be avoided. It is unjust to sugf1est that members of the Government are not human like ourselves. Some pain has had to be inflicted; but no one can imagine that the Government have inflicted needless pain, or that they have not acted for the good of the colony as kindly and humanely as possible. I feel sincerely for those officers who are going to be totally dismissed, and I would venture to throw out a suggestion which, if accepted, would be of great benefit to some of them in times like these, when it is so difficult to find even casual work. I understand that some capable men in the Customs may possibly be turned away. There is a good deal of overtime earned by officers in that department, men who are already paid fairly good salaries for the work they do. I am informed that they earn nearly as much by overtime-that is, working after 4 o'clock-as their ordinary salaries amount to. My sugges­tion is that those. men who are to be paid off should be attached as supernumeraries to the department, that the overtime work should be given to them, and that the stationary men should be content with the fixed salaries they are getting.

The COLONIAL TREASURER : That is arranged.

Mr. BURNS : The reductions in some of the departments have afforded me a great deal of satisfaction. I have never yet been able to see, for instance, what return the country gets for the large amounts voted every year for the Agent-General's office in London ; and I am pleased to see that one of my own profession, an engineer, who was receiving £800 a year, has been cut down to .£300 ; and it will be very interesting, when we get into committee, to learn what he does even for £300. There is one thing I feel a little disappointed in. I understood from the Statement that whatever was chargeable to a department or an individual would be

Supply. [2 AuGusT.] Supply. 343

found under one he~tding. That is not the case. We find the immigration vote on one page, and another item for contingencies connected with it on another page ; but those are matters that can be set right in committee. Like other hon. members, I have been eeriously exercised by my constituents about the reduction of the grants to local bodies. But I suppose the Government simply cannot help themselves; they have not got the money, and the boards must try to get on as best they can with· out it. We are all disappointed. If there was more money we should all be "as happy as Larry," and nobody would complain. There is one matter I should like to mention, although I may be considered presumptuous in doing so, und that is that I feel a strong regret that you, Mr. Speuker, have not the power to impose certain penultiee on members who forget them­selves and attribute dishonourable motives to other members of the House.

The SPEAKER: The hon. member is hardly in order in speaking as he does, because he is attributing a want of impartiality to the Chair. Had I heard any hon. member accusing another hon. member of dishonourable motives I should immediately have stopped him.

Mr. BURNS: I am afraid I have not made myself quite clear. I was referring to the fact that the time of the House, which could have been much better occupied, has been taken up for three-quarters of an hour owing to a churge having been made that has ·apparently given offence to one hon. member. We are here to do our best for the country, and it is a pity there should be so much time w:tsted by going into these recriminations.

Mr. O'CONNELL : I do not intend to occupy more than a few minutes, but I wish to explain the vote I am going to give. To a certain extent I intend to support the Government, though I cannot say I altogether agree with their pro· posals for retrenchment. When I was up for re-election I stated to my constituents that the Government would have to make large reductions in Civil servants' salaries, but I thought those reductions would be made on a progressive scale, and that the higher the salary was the larger would be the propor· tion of the reduction. I do not think it fair that men with s:;claries of, say, £200, should have the same amount deducted as men drawing £1,000 a year. We need only compare the reduction of £100 in the salaries of Ministers with a reduction of £4/5 out of a salary of £225, which has been made in my electorate. A reduction of 10 per cent. is nothing in a large salary, whereas it means a great deal to the men with small salaries. I am sure the Government have no wish to do anything unfair, and I hope they will con· sider whether it is not possible, in cases where offices have been to a certain extent abolished, some compensation could not be given to those officers, or that they will not have the full amount deducted from the balance of their salaries. The reductions in the Education Department, where the heud teachers not only have a portion of their emoluments taken away, but have to suffer the full 10 per cent. on top of that, ~eems to me simply outrageous, and I cannot believe the Government will carry that idea out. I cannot believe they had really given the matter full consideration when the announcement was made. A good deal has been said about the sugar industry, and it is said to be a fearful thing that we should have in this country a different class of people from ourselves. I will merely give one instance of its value to the country. It has been said that the land values of the country have been largely increased

by the construction of rail ways. In my district there is a railway made right up to the Isis Scrub, and there it has stopped for years. It has added lees than no value to the ltmd it came to, because there was no remunerative employment to which that land could be put. A sugar-mill has since been erected, with the result that the people in the scrub are making any amount of money where before they were almost starving. Up to the time of the erection of the mill, men who went out there 'fifteen or twenty yeurs ago to make homes for them. se] ves led little more than a starvation existence; now there is comfort and plenty nearly every­where. We were told by the hon. member for South Brisbane that the kanakas were black slaves. I can assure him that, if all white labourers were as well paid and as well treated as the kanakas are in the Bundaberg district, there would not be very much to complain about. Another matter is the settlement of people on the land, and I would call attention to the extraordinary way in which the Government tempt people to settle on the land. Some grazing lands in my electorate were taken up at a certain rate, and the lessees, finding them· selves unable to make a living, abandoned them. Most people, when they cannot get t~nants, reduce the rents; but the Government, mstead of reducing the rents, increased them 3d. per acre. Another set of grazing farms were taken up by the friends of the squatters, and one year's rent was paid. After some lapse of time these lands were forfeited, and later on were thrown opE'n. But how? In one instance the rent was doubled, and on auother it was raised from 1~d. to 2d. per acre. Other lands were gazetted to be open on a certain date ; but before that date arrived they were withdrawn, although there are numbers of men anxious to occupy them. These are facts which I can vouch for. Instead of settling people on the land, this is the way to keep them off. I make these remarks to put myself right with my constituents, and to endeavour to obtain some different means of encouraging settlement.

Mr. KING : I intend to vote for the amend· ment, and shall be more consistent in my reasons for so voting than the hon. member who has just sat down was in regard to the vote he proposes to give. I think that the burden of this retrenchmBnt does not fall upon the proper shoulders. The strongest plank in my platform when I addressed my constituents was retrench· ment ; but I had no intention of applying that retrenchment to a certain section of the Govern· ment employees, and retrenching them almost out of existence. The hon. member for Leich· hardt said a certain section were retrenched to the extent of 60 per cent. The junior member for Charters Towers said in the North they were retrenched 15 per cent., but that that did not apply to the South. It does apply to the South, and to even a greater extent, be· cause men are reduced 15 to 17 per cent. One man who was receiving £140 a year has been reduced to £116 12s., and another, whose wages were £109 4s., has been reduced to £93 12s. ; and no hon. member on the Treasury benches can conscientiously say that a man can keep a wife and three or four children, as they should be kept, on that amount. For £93 12s. that man has to work every day in the week, and every week in the year; for if he loses any time he does not get paid for it. The Defence Force vote was pretty well thrashed out at the elections, and I am greatly in sympathy with those who would like to see the whole thing done away with. I do not say this with any feeling of disrespect towards the force, for I was a member of the corps which has offered its services to the Government without any

344 Supply. [.ASSEMBLY.] Supply.

remuneration at all-D company, Roma-than which there is not a better corps in the colony. Those who sent me here are also of opinion that we do not want any Defence Force at present, because we can have an efficient body of men by subsidising rifle corps and cadets. The latter are the ones to whom we must look for the defence of the colony in future; and if we devote some Government money to assisting the cadets in the back country towns, we will be conferring a benefit on the country. In connection with the proposal to decrease the endowment to local bodies, I may say that I have been a member of the Roma Municipal Council; and I know that if the endowment is reduced to 5s. in the £1, that council will be in a very bad way indeed. I hope the matter will be taken into comideration, and that there will be an increase on the amount proposed by the 'rreasurer. :For the reasons I have given, I intend to support the amendment.

Mr. RA vVLINGS : I intend to support the amendment because I think it about fits the case. The Treasurer in his I<'inancial Statement says that the sum of £2,600,000 has been spent on immigration ; but, according to the figure" sup­plied by the Treasury, the amount is over £3,000,000; and I would like to know how many immigrants have been brought here for that money? I do not think it will be a good thing to continue spending money in that direction. 'l'he Treasurer also makes the statement that we must spend as little loan money as possible, and that so long as the money is in the banks we get quite as much interest as we have to pay. I am sorry the money is in the banks ; 1 think it would be wise to release it a~ soon as pos­sible and spend it on reproductive public works. Another matter in which I am deeply interested i" the Treasurer's statement that the "opening of the Cairns extension to Mareeba on the 1st of next month will have the effect of diverting to the railway the whole of the goods a.nd mineral traffic to and from the extensive mineral areas in the Herberton and W alsh districts, which has hitherto found its way to Port Douglas, beside.~ affording an outlet for the enormous quantities of cedar which have been lying for years in the vicinity of the terminus, waiting means of tra~sit to port, ":nd giving access to the rich agrwultural distrtcts on the tableland beyond Granite Creek." I question that statement very much. I know that up till now they have not been able to compete with bullock teams and packers, and I do not think they are likely to do so because they extend the railway five miles. Unless the Commissioners can bring down the charge;; very much, they will not be able to run the packers off, and they will not he able to shut up Port Douglas. We do not want the Govern­ment to spend money for which they will get no return ; but I think they are a little hasty in their intention to shut up Port Douglas­a place that has paid its way- becauge by that statement they have lowered the value of property in the place. The hon. member for Croydon has shown that the Department of Mineo, has been cut down 34 per cent. ; and I think it must be owing to the inexperience of the present Minister for Mines that the pros­pecting vote has been knocked off. The Premier accused this party of voting against the Govern­ment, no matter what proposal might be brought forward; but I am prepared to support any measure that I think will be to the advantage of the country, independent of party. A few days ago the Queensland National Bank reconstruction scheme was brought before us, and we desired to have an inquiry into the position of the bank before we supported the Bill; but we were told that the Colonial Treasurer and the Secretary for Lands had made an investigation, and that

things were all right. vVhat do we find now ? They were £800,000 out in the amount of the liabilities.

The ATTORNEY-GENERAL: Quite wrong. Mr. RA WLINGS : I am not wrong, if the

Courier report is correct. The ATTORNEY-GENERAL: I was there,

and I ought to know. Mr. RA WLINGS : The hon. gentleman had

to say that the liabilities were £731,000 more. He amended the figures from £7,988,000 to £8,730,000, according to yesterday's CoU1"iM". \V e are expected to trust the Government a great deal in their stat~ments; and as the Oppo"ition have shown that they were right in that case, it may be they are right now in their opposition to the financial pro­posals of the Government. The Colonial Secre­tary said that in his department there has not been a case of anyone drawing less than £150 having been reduced; but I notice that the vote for sixteen clerks in the office of the Regis­trar of Titles has been reduced from £2,450 to £2,363; the additional annual pay to sergeants and constables has been reduced from £3,000 to £300; and-what seems an especially hard case­the travelling allowance to constables attending court as witnesses has been reduced from £300 to nothing.

Tbe SPEAKER: The hon. member must not refer to the Estimates in detail.

Mr. RA WLINGS : Looking through the Estimates, I am forced to come to the conclusion that reductions have been made in the lower grades of the service, and that they have been rather hardly treated. If we can point out any instance where such reductions have been made, we will be able to refute the statement of the Colonial Secretary. With regard to the expenditure of loan money for the ensuing year, I find that on the Southern railways there is to he a large amount spent. In my district we have a railway on which over £1,000,000 has been expended, but there is no hope of getting anything like a return from it until it is extended to the mineral districts, in spite of the millions of feet of cedar lying ready to be carried to the port. The rail way has been in course of construction for eight years, and it is better to push on with it as soon as possible than to incur a loss year after year. There are very large sums of money in the colony, some of which will, undoubtedly, be available before long. With regard to the 10 per cent. reduction, I under­stand that even those who have been reduced, as lc,ng as their salaries remain above £150, will be reduced again. Now, that is most unfair. I believe also that the sooner a general income ta.x is proposed the better.

Mr. KERR: As one who was returned pledged to retrenchment, I cannot see eye to eye with the Government in regard to their scheme of retrenchment. The pruning book appears to have been used very largely in the Central district_ The Government seem to have had that district specially in view. The Colonial Treasurer con­gratulated himself upon the fact that the returns from the pu hlic lands had been larger than for any year during the past ten years. The renson for that was the large sales under the Special Sales of Land Act. In 1891-2 the receipts under that Act were £125,000, and in 1892-3 the receipts amounted to £149,064, the greater part of which came from sales in the Central district. In the face of that, I find that, out of eleven police magistrates who are being dispensed with, four are in the Central district; out of seven land commis­sioners, four are in the Central district; and out

Supply. [2 AuGUST.] Supply. 345

of seven medical officers, six are in the same district. That shows that we are to have a large share of the retrenchment. The threats held out to the electorR during the general election by the supporters of the Go­vernment have been fully carried out. Those threats were that, if a Labour member was returned to represent Barcoo, it could expect nothing from the Government. \Ve do not expect anything in the shape of increased salaries, but we expect our fair and just due. Then, again; we find, according to the Colonial Treasnrer, that the Central Railway is the only one that had an increased revenue, and on that line we find the employees have been reduced from 7s. 6d. to 7s. a day, so that the prayer lieardin their tents is now changed from "Peril and sudden death, good Lord, deliver us," to "From the Rail­way Commissioners, good Lord, deliver us and our children." I was pledged to retrenchment, but I object to it in this form. I believe in wiping out the Defence Force altogether, and in repealing the Naval Defence Act. vV e are told that that would be an act of repudiation ; but there is no doubt, when it was passed, members voted against the wishes of the people. As to the Defence Force, I am much struck, as a stranger, with the number of officers I meet in the streets and the few privates. I think the privates must have been wiped out by the shearers' strike, and only the officers surviiced.

The COLONIAL SIWRETARY: Would you vote for the abolition of the police, too ?

Mr. KERR: No. I think I have as favour­able a record as the Colonial Secretary for obey­ing the law. The police have never had occ·tsion to put their hands on me, and I have lived in a greater number of places in the colony than the Colonial Secretary. I think those who know me will say I have been a law-abiding citizen, though I believe I am termed an agitator. The Government in thPir retrenchment schemes have cut down the bores in my electorate. l!'or the bore at Tambo a cc.retaker is paid £120, and the Government received £30 per annum from it.

The HoN. B. D. MOREHEAD: We pay £150 a year for a bore to represent it.

Mr. KERR : The hon. member is very smart and witty. He was not so witty when he had to get out of the back door when addressing his own electors.

The HoN. B. D. MOREHEAD : He never had to do it.

Mr. KERR : I am not here for the sake of the £150 per annum, because I earn a great deal more than that in my workshop. I pay u man £1 a week more than I receive for being a mem­ber of Parliament, so that I am not making much by being here. The bores of which I speak were used at the general election as a means of helping the Government candidate. The bore at Blackall was turned on by the Colonial Treasurer in view of the general elec­tion, and the voters were informed that they would have the bore if they returned my opponent. If retrenchment has to take place, why were not these bores handed pver to the local authorities ?

The COLONIAL SECRETARY : That has been done.

Mr. KERR: Then it has been done very lately. Instead of turning the water on free when sheep belonging to Mr. Casey, of Terrick Terrick, and the Chief Secretary's Wc··,tlands sheep were passing through, the Government would have acted more creditablY if they

"turned the water on when it was wanted by the the public and the ratepayers. The junior member for Rockhampton gave a very good

reason for the demand for Central separation in pointing out that the Government were selling so much of the land in the Central districts. The Colonial1'reasurer informs us that if we received the same amount of revenue from our special sales of land for the next ten years as we did for the last two or three years, we would, as a colony, be free from d~bt. No doubt ; but Centml Queensland would be wiped out. There would be no need for Central separation then, as the lands of the Central dis­trict would be in the hands of syndicates and Union Mortgage and other companies. The hon. member also aptly stated that the people of the Central districts look upon those lands as the heritage of themselves and their children. All who are in Queensland are not going to Paraguay. Some have made their homes here, and I am one of those who think Queensland is not the worst place to Ii ve in. I have been in other colonies, and I consider Queensland would be the best colony, after all, if we had better laws. I was returned pledged to a progressive land tax, but I do not see it being brought forward. Though a property holder, I am also in favour of a property tax. I believe that by the means of such taxes we would raise a fair amount of revenue, and place the burden of taxation on the right shoulders, which the hon. member for Maryborongh shows is not proposed by the Government in their retrenchment proposals. I believe in placing the burden on the proper shoulders ; and if a dying Parliament could raise the salary of the Chief Justice by £1,000, I cannot see why this Parliament could not reduce it. It may be that I do not understand the law, and I have no desire to understand it, as my dealings with law appear on the wrong side of my ledger. I notice there is no mention of the abolition of the Civil Service superannuation fund in the Financial Statement.

The SECRETARY FOR LANDS : It will abolish itself before long.

Mr. KERR : I tru,ot it will. I know one Civil servant who was a member of the police force, and paid into the superannuation fund of the force for years. He resigned of his own will, and received nothing from the fund. He afterwards joined the Telegraph Department, and is now paying into the Civil Service fund. If, of his own will, he leaves that department before he has attained a certain age, I take it he will get nothing from the fund he is compelled to pay into. I hold that that is very unfair. There am many men in the service who· are members of benefit societies, and who have made provision by insurance for their families in case of their death or sickness. Many of them are insured in officAs that are sound and stable, while the best actuaries in the country declare that the Civil Service superannuation fund is not either sound or stable. The time has, I think, arrived when that fund should be abolished. I have been sorry to see in the Financia-l Statement that the endowments to local bodies are to be reduced. I remember that an election was taking place in the Leichhardt just at the time the divisional boards were started, and the gentleman at that time addressing the electors, Mr. Jlilacfarlane, stated the advantages to be derived by the doing away with the Government road parties we had been used to, and the spending of the money raised in the district locally, and he explained that the Government endowment was to be at the rate of £2 for £1 rai··ed in the district. The Government have certainly gone back on the endowment provided for by Parliament at that time. It has been reduced to £1, and now we are informed that it is proposed to still further reduce it to 5s. in the £1. If that is all the

34G Supply. [ASSEMBLY.] Supply.

endowment they are going to give the boards they had better wipe thPmout altogether or they will wipe themBelves out. At a rP,cent confer­ence at Charters Towers, where seventeen local bodies were represented, a resolution was carried by a large majority to the effect that in the opinion of the conference, the endowmen't should not be reduced below 12s. 6d. in the .£1 on general rates collected. It must be recollected that many of those local bodies have overdraft;; and, if they only get an endowment of 5s. in th~ £1, many of them will be compelled either to reconstruct or go in sol vent.

The CO.LONIAL SECRETARY : Or re­trench, whwh is the best way.

Mr. KERR : Some of them have retrenched so far t~at retrenchment cannot go any further. There IS no mention made in the Financial Statement, I regret to see, ab0ut land settle­ment. One of the members of the late Govern­ment told us they were in favour of land settle­ment; and one of the means adopted in the Barcoo to induce settlement was that they let the squatters have the land at ~d. an acre, while they charged the small grazing farmer 3d. an acre. That is the encouragement offered for small graziers to take up land. I trust the Secretary for Lands will look into this matter, because there are large numbers of persons who want to come from Victoria and other colonies to take up small grazing farms in ti1at district. I know there is more money circulated in the Barcoo by the grazing farmers and the selectors than by the large syndicates that exist in that electoratfl. The education vote has had a slap, ae has been expected. f?r some ~i':'e. I know c-ome persons are of opmwn that rt IS the over-education of the n~tives of the colony which brought about the diecon.tent that resulted in the shearers' strike. That IS not my opinion. I believe that if we had a little more education, and if education went a little further and was made compulsory it ~ould be a very good thing. There are many nat!ves of the eolony who cannot even sign therr names, and for tho,t their parents are to blame. It is high time the Government stepped in and enforced the compulsory clauses of the Education .Act. Then we are to have a reduction in Hansard. Hon. members cannot accuse me of taking up much space in Hansa1·d. I have not spoken to my constituents through that publication, nor do I intend doing w, because I can speak to them when I am there In my opinion, the proposal to reduce Hansard is that the speeches of the Labour members may be curtailed. The Colonial Secretary says that a similar change has been voted for by the Labour party in South Australia. That may be; pr?bablythe circumstances are different. The Adelaide Press may not give such garble<i reports as the Press in Brisbane of what Labour members say. Members on both sides of the House are of. opini'?n that we should have an official repm·t With whwh there can be no "shinanikin." We do n~t wanp to be ruled by that old lady, the Cfnurtpr, wh.wh may, perha"Rs, have .a large circula­tiOn m Bnsbane ; but Brisbane IS not Queens­land. Members on the other side ou"ht to remember that Brisbane would be ot' little importance if the Central and Northern districts were separated from it. Probably that is the reason why Southern members have always voted agamst separation; and if so it is a very selfish spirit. It is not likely' that the CeD;tral and Northern people would send their busmess away from their commercial friends in Br!sbane.. If it is to their advantage to deal with Bnsbane mstead of England, they will do so. It is shown in .the Financial Statement that the Nor­thern Railway has paid its way, and the Central Railway has also paid its way-perhaps because

~here are not so many deadheads travelling upon It as upon the Southern and Western. When the Railway Border Tax Bill was before us, the argument was that New South Wales was taking away traffic that rightly belonged to the Southern and ·western line. Now, we in the Central district have the same grievance. There are lower rates on the latter than on the Central line and if we get separation we would be forced to put on a border tax against the Southern portion of the colony. This was the first Financial Statement I have listened to, and I must say I listened to it with great pleasure. Still, I shall vote for the amendment, and in committee I shall endeavour to show the Treasurer that the Central district has been very unfairly dealt with.

Mr. C.ADELL: I did not intend to speak and would not do so had it not been that the Colonial Secretary twitted me for being silent. Old members will remember that mem­bers for the Burnett have n'>t spoken much and I am no exception to the rule. I hav~ resided in the Burnett for a long time, and have been sent here by the men I have worked shoulder to shoulder with. I remember soon after I was returned to Parliament th~ Colonial Secretary asked which class of ele~tors had sent me here. Well, I was sent here by the tradesmen and the genuine workers of the Burnett, and was opposed by a unionist on one side and a conservative on the other. I went before my constituents again, and they returned me with a larger majority than at first. I can tell the Colonial Secretary that when I retire he will probably find a talkative unionist in my place. I may •ay, in passing, that the Burnett is the only electorate in the colony, perhaps that has doubled its population during the last five years. I intend to vote for the amendment pro­posed by the leader of the Opposition, because I think the retrenchment scheme of the Govern­ment is not what it should be. I believe in the Volunteer Force. I think there is no country in the world where you can find a better lot of men for soldiers-men who can ride, and shoot, and do the roughing which soldiers are supposed to do; and I think that, instead of taking away the few pounds from the Volunteer Force, the amount for them should have been increased, and the Permanent Force removed altogether.

The ATTORNEY-GENERAL: We do not touch the volunteers at all.

Mr. CAD ELL: I have seen in the papers lately that companies on the Downs have offered their services free.

The ATTORNEY-GENERAL: They belong to the Defence Force.

Mr. C.ADELL : Of course there is a great dea:l of ~alk about the headquarters staff, and I beheve It ought to be reduced. I agree with the hon. member for Oxley, that the Land Act of 1884 is one of the best Acts we ever had, and that if it were amended in the shape of giving selection J;>efore survey it would be a perfect Act. I also believe in agricultural settlement and iri agricultural colleges. There is such a college in New South Wales, and I believe it is a great success ; and I hope that in a few years we shall have one in Queensland. I very much regret that the prospecting vote has been done away with· I think the Government would have been doing rig-ht if they had increased the vote beyond .£2,000 instead of abolishing ·it, because the dis­covery of a good goldfield would help more than anything else to bring the colony out of its difficulties. ~

The COLONIAL TREASURERhavingrisen to speak,

[2 .A.uGtrsT.] Supply. 347

Mr. POWERS said : I wish to say a few words in reply to the discussion on the amendment.

The SPEAKER: The hon. member having spoken can only speak again by consent of the House.

HoNOURABLE ME>fBERS: Hear, hear! Mr. POWERS : Before the motion is put I

wish to say a few words as to my position with regard to the amendment. The Premier, in replying to me the other night, said he was glad that it was not in the power of hon. members to move increaSf'3 on items in the Estimates, for that would lead to no end of trouble ; and he added that it was only in this way they could show their disapproval of the policy of the Government. That is the reason why the amendment was moved. The acceptance of the Treasurer'• proposals without such a motion would have meant that all the re­ductions in all departments were practically accepted- the reduction in Hansard, the abolition of the prospecting vote, the reduc­tion of endowments to local authorities, and the policy of reducing the higher salaries no more than they propose by the Estimates, and the 10 per cent. deduction. I am now referring to the higher salaries below those coming in the schedules. When we get into committee we pass straight over the schedules to the Esti­mates ; and if an amendment had not been proposed, exception could properly be taken to any opposition that had not been indicated during the debate on the Financial Statement. The necessity for the amendment has also been proved to a certain extent. The Treasurer said in his Statement that "the salaries of Ministers thus escape deduction"; and the Premier, when replying to me, did not say it was the intention of the Government to do anything else. If it had been intended at first to make the deduc­tion from Ministers' salaries, the Premier would have said so then; so that in that way I think the debate has done good. So strong was the oppo.sition to the vote to the Defence Force that the hon. gentleman practi­cally gave an open hand to hon. members on that side. In regard to those two matters, therefore, the amendment has had a good effect. The country and the House are better satisfied that this debate has taken place, seeing we know that debate is to be allowed upon those things. As to the congratula­tions of the Government, I did not exrJect them, and as long as I am here and do my duty, I am not likely to get their hone.st congratulations. When I do, it will be time for hon. members on this side to look out for a;nother leader.

The SECRETARY FOR LANDS: It is a usual thing for the leader of the Opposition to b~ congratulated by the Government "when all are, working for the good of the country.

Mr. POWERS : One personal matter to which I wish now to allude is a statement made by the Premier that during the year I was in office there was the big,gest deficit.

The COLONIAL TREASURER: This is unfair. You are speaking of yourself now.

Mr. POWEHS: If it is unfair I do not wish to go on with it.

The COLONIAL TREASURER: You are taking advantage of the indulgence of the House to re-argue the whole question.

Mr. POWERS: I wish to point out that I only became a member of the JYiinistry, of which the Premier was himself the leader, after the Esti­mates had been framed, and all I had to do was to keep within the limit, which I did, so that I was in no way responsible for the deficit. If the House

will not permit me to allude to that I cannot deal with the criticism of the hon. member for Mackay with reference to an income ta;<. Every session since I first came here I have advocated an income tltx. The previous Government had gone to the country on the hnd tax and been defeated, and the Premier said at that time that he would not put on an income tax. Those things being impracticable, I saw,that we must come to a property tax; but in every session I have advocated the imposition of an income tax. I will put off my reply to the attack of the hon. member for North Brisbane and of the Colonial Secretary until some other time when I shall have the right of reply. As far as the Colonial Secretary is concerned, I hope that now that his bile is worked off, things will go on better. The hon. gentleman went to Maryborough and tried to defeat me, but did not succeed. I have no feeling against the hon. gentleman, and I shall be generous enough to forgive him for his attack this afternoon. I do not wish to cause any bickering in this Chamber.

The COLONIAL SECRETARY: It is a pity you did not take the same course when you attacked me in Maryborough.

Mr. POWERS: The hon. gentleman attacked me in Maryborough.

Mr. ANNEAR: No; never. Mr. POWERS : Well, I thought so. At

any rate, I am quite prepared to meet the Colonial Secretary, or any other member on the Government side, and if I am beaten I cannot help it, as I shall have done my best. As to the etatement that this amendment should not have been moved, I should not have felt that I was doing my duty had I not moved it, and I be­lieve the discussion has clone good. As to the advice of hon. members opposite, I am not here to tak8' advice from them, unl~ss it falls in with my convictions as leader of the Opposition. As to the Colonial Treasurer stating that as a party we are disorganised, I only hope that no member of the party, not­withstanding the interjections that have been made, will ever break any pledge he has given his constituents. I believe the Opposition will work fairly, and will assist the Government when they are acting in the best interests of the country, and that when they believe the Govern­ment are not acting fairly and squarely, we shall then be found to be an organised Opposition to do our best to make the Government do what is right.

The SECRETARY FOR LANDS : They will cut you away when they have done with you.

Mr. POWERS: I believe the hon. gentleman is right, When I no longer do my duty they will throw me over.

The SECRETARY FOR LANDS : Whether you do or not-as soon as you commence to do it.

Mr. HOOLAN : It is the end of all political life to be cast aside.

Mr. POWERS : As far as the Secretary for Lands is concerned, I believP- that I made the interjection I am reported to have made. What I meant was that I believe the hon. gentleman, for the honour of his position, will sink his private judgment, as other members of the Government will have to do.

The SECRETARY FOR LANDS: You are mistaken.

Mr. POWERS: I so,y thitt is my belief. As far as the monetary consideration is concerned, I do not believe that that is what keeps the hon, gentleman in his seat. I believe that I have done my duty in moving the amendment, and with that I leave it to the House,

348 Supply. [ASSEMBLY.]

The COLONIAL TREASURER, in reply : It is only right that I should say a few words in reply, though the House must be as tired of the debate as I am. N othin!i' I can say is likely to alter the vote of any non. member; but one feature which has developed itself during the debate, and which I am extremely sorry to see, is that there are a number of hon. members who come here, not to make themselves part of a de­liberative and cons\1ltative body, but with the one object in view of turning the Government out. And not only of turning out this Govern­ment, but, as we have been plainly told, of turning out every other Government. If that is so, what is the use of ParJiament at all? I do congratulate the leader of the Opposition upon attaining his position. More than that, I sympathise with him. I have been leader of the Opposition myself, and I know the diffi­culties of the position. 'When I waH in the position I never had the opportunity that our new lender of the. Opposition now enjoys. The Labour party never made any overtures to me. They never came and asked me to lead them. I am not quite sure whether it is the Opposition. that is wagging the Labour party, or the Labour party that is wagging the Opposition. So far, there is only one thing common to the heterogeneous conglomera­tion of elccments that we see opposite, and that is, their de.<ire to turn the Government out­rightly or wrongly to turn the Government out.

HoNOURABLE MEMBERS: No, no! The COLONIAL TREASURER: That is

what I gather. However, I do not want to put the House in a bad humour. I wish now to thank hon. members for the intelligent way in which they have criticised the Statement.

Mr. REID : Which side do you mean ? The COLONIAL TREASURER : Both

sides. vYhen I took office as Colonial Treasurer, I believed it was my duty. I knew what w;xs in front of me. I knew that troubles were coming. I knew that ·I should get no sympathy or thanks. I did not expect any, and have not got them. At the same time, when a man thinks he can do something for his country, it is his duty to try and do it ; and one thing I congratulate myself upon is that I have made a J<'inancial Statement of which nohon. member has said he thoroughly approves. That is the very best praise I could get, and I am glad to get it from both sides. I am rather sorry that the amendment was moved, because one or two hon. members on this side have said it would restrain them from criticising the Statement. I am sorry, be•Jause I wanted to get. all the criticism I could. If one section of the House had a.pproved, and another di·mpproved, that would have shown there was some partiality about the Statement; but as everybody objects to it, it must be fair. No single member has given his thorough ap­proval to it. I do not agree with the leader of the Opposition, of course. He and I have been colleagues both on this and the Opposition bench, but I thank him for having made an extremely weak speech. He wanted a week to consider the ')Uestion, which I am sorry he did not take. Had he read it carefully, he might have refrained from moving the amendment he did. I think hon. members on the other side have been misled by the leader of the Opposition in this way : that they consider a motion of this sort was necessary in or.Jer to get up a debate on the Financial Statement-such a thing is absolutely absurd. There is always a debate on the Statement, and that is the time when members can speak generally on all subjects. \Ye might just as well have had this debate in Committee of Supply as in the House. It would have been quite a different thing if I had asked

the House to go into Committee of Ways and Means, and then proposed some scheme of taxation, and laid down the g·eneral lines upon which it was to be raised. Then it might have been right and proper to have moved the amendment that has been moved; but, as a matter of fact, I made no financial proposals to the House. I made a statement merely ; I intimated that I was going to ask the House to allow a Bill to be brought in for the purpose of retrenchment. But the leader of the Opposition says, "No; we shall not have retrenchment at all." That is the point-whether we are to have retrenchment or no retrenchment.

Mr. POWERS: No. The COLONIAL TREASURER : Show me

anything in the statement to the contrary. The amendment is to the effect that we shall do no business-that we shall throw out the whole Estimates, and return them to the Government, and request that a new set be sent down. That is the only alternative. I wish the House to understand exactly what they are voting on. The question is: _Shall we have retrenchment or not?

Mr. POWERS: Or- unsatisfactory retrench­ment.

The COLONIAL TREASURER: The alter­native is with one section of the Opposition to have an income tax, and with another sec­tion to have a land tax. Which of these we were to have, I do not know. I have no mandate from my constituents to put any tn,xation at all on the people. It does not matter which of those two taxes you put on, it must fall on the whole community, and really, after all, the whole of this discussion has ari~en on a very small matter-simply whether certain people are to be brought under retrenchment or not. If it could be shown that the judges and other high officials could have been retrenched, then apparently the whole of the Opposition would have been perfectly satisfied. Well, that is a very paltry thing. It has been clearly shown that the House has not the power to do it. Even if they attempted it, though the leader of the Opposition has said the House is all-powerful, they would soon find that the powers of the House are limited. I am quite sure the Imperial Government would not interfere with a free colony like ours, except upon grave occasion; but the one grave occasion on which they would interfere, and upon which they .have interfere~, and that not so very long ago, 1s when tj1ere IS even a semblance of repudiation. That is what is advocated by the other side-repudiation. :Repudiation of Her Majesty's Governor, of Her Majesty's Judges, and of Her Majesty's Minis­ters.

Mr. DUNSFORD: Speak for yourself. We never advocated that.

The COLONIAL TREASURER : I do speak for myself, and I speak for the colony. No one knows better than the leader of the Opposition that that is a scheme that could not be carried out.

Mr. POWERS : You pointed out how it could be done; and I said, "Do it."

The COLONIAL TREASURER : That means no retrenchment, but an income tax. This is only pandering, in my opinion, to popular prejudice. It is also carrying out a certain amount of revenge. Certain people on the other side of the House, and po,rticularly the " man Friday" of the leader of the Opposition, who sits behind his leader and fabricates the bolts, and gives them to the leader of the Opposition to fire, have got a perfect hatred of the Railway Commissioners; and the hon. member I refer to is

Supply. [3 AUGUST.] Cost qf Post 9" Telegrapl• Conference. 349

one of the best haters in the Southern Hemis­phere. Because he wants to punish the Railway Commissioners, we have this motion before the House, and all this time wasted.

Mr. PO\VERS: You are entirely wrong. The COLONIAL TREASURER : I am

not wrong. I know the leader of the Opposi­tion, and I know his "man Friday." Great fault has been found with me because I did not announce in the Statement that Ministers' salaries would be retrenched. It has been proved now that the matter was a purely voluntary one on their part, and they need not have consented to the reduction unless they liked. I have the greatest objection to adopting the rOle of a poli­tical Pharisee, and it was not for me to proclaim from the housetops that Ministers were pre­pared to make a magnificent donation of £730 to the colony. I would much rather see the £730 devoted to paying the leader of the Opposi­toin. I have always contended that the leader of the Opposition should be paid, and if we paid a fair salary for the office we might get a good article. I have to intimate that the regiment with which I have the honour to be connected, including the whole of the companies from Roma to Warwick, and their band, have voluntarily offered their services free to the public.

HONOURABLE MEMBERS : Hear, hear ! The COLONIAL TREASURER: I have

also to intimate that already, and even to-day, I have received information that some of the high officers under schedule B are willing- to be retrenched, 'and request me to deduct the 10 per cent. from their salaries.

HONOURABLE MEMBERS: Hear, hear ! An HoNOURABLE MEliBER : We are getting

along. The amendment has done good. The COLONIAL TREASURER : The

amendment ! I will keep the House no longer, but I wish the country to see, by the division we are now to take, what hon. members are desirous of putting further burdens upon the people, and what hon. member" think and believe that the Government should carry out, for this year at least, the moderate scheme of retrenchment pro­posed or hinted at in the l<'inancial Statement.

Question-That the words propoSf'd to be omitted stand part of the question-put; and the House divided:-

AYES, 44. ~fessrs. Bar low, Nelson, Byrnes, Tozer, Philp, Dickson,

Morehead, Thorn, Foxton, Smith, Grimes, Armstrong, Smyth, Callan, Allan, Bell, Thomas, l\Iacfarlane, Cribb, Lord, Stevens, Duffy, O'Connell, Phillips, M01·gan, Burns, Plunkett, Corfield, Cameron, Hamilton, Tooth, Petrie, Dalrymple, Chataway, Kingsbury, Stephens, Battersby, Archer, l\fcjfaster, Crombie, V\,..atson, l\:1idson, Agnew, andAnnear.

NOES, 24. Messrs. Powers, Drake, G1·oom, Lovejoy, Fogarty,

Cadell, Curtis, Boles, Daniels, },isher, Jack,,on, llrowne, Cross, Dunsford, Rawlings, Leahy, Turley, Reid, Hoolan, Dawson, King, Kerr, llardacre, and McDonald.

Question resolved in the affirmative. Question-'rhat the Speaker do now leave the

chair-put and passed. Cmrii!ITTEE.

Question-That there be granted for the ser­vice of the year 1893-4 a sum not exceeding £300 for salary for the aide·de-catnp to His Excellency the Governor-put.

The HoN. J. R. DICKSON asked when it was intended to introduce the Bill dealmg with the 10 per cent. reduction in salaries? It was very desirable that the Bill should be before hon. mem­bers before they proceeded with the Estimates.

The COLONIAL TREASURER said the Bill would be introduced to-morrow.

Mr. POvVERS asked when the Government intended to proceed with the Estimates after passing the vote then before the Committee?

The COLONIAL TRl<}ASURER said that as soon as the item was passed he proposed to move the Chairman out of the chair. The business for next day would be the introduction of the two Bills on the notice paper, and the Bill dealing with retrenchment. After that, if there "as no other business, the House would go on with the Estimates.

lVIr. MoD ON ALD suggested that the item be postponed. There appeared to be something like a trap in it, and he wanted to find out all about it.

The COLONIAL TREASURER said he could assure the suspicious member that there was no trap at all about it. He simply wanted to pass that one item as a matter of form, and then move the Chairman out of the chair.

Mr. Me DON ALD moved that the vote be reduced by £200.

Amendment put and negatived; and original question put and pak.,ed.

The House re;umed ; the CHAIRMAN reported progress, and obtained leave to sit again to­morrow.

MEAT AND DAIRY PRODUCE ENCOURAGEMENT BILL.

On the motion of the COLONIAL TREA­SURER, it was resolved-

That the IIonse will, at its next sitting, resolve itself into a Committee of the Whole to consider the desirable­ness of introducing a Bill to encourage the manufacture and export of meat and dairy produce.

CO-OPERATIVE COMMUNITIES LAND SETTLEMENT BILL.

On the motion of the SECRETARY FOR LANDS, it was resolved--

That the House will, nt its next sit~ing, resolv'~ itself into a Committee of the Whole to consider the de1nable­ness of introclueing a Bill to amend the Crown Lands Acts, 1884 to 1892, and to promote settlement by co­operative communities.

ADJOURNMENT. The COLONIAL TREASURER: I move

that this House do now adjourn. Que'ltion put and passed. The House adjourned at a quarter past 11

o'clock.