The Mercury (Hobart, Tas. : 1860 - 1954)(about) |
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Friday 27 December 1901
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THE COMMONWEALTH
WORK OF THE SESSION.
REVIEW BY MR. BARTON.
SYDNEY, December 23.
Mr. Barton replied to the toast of '"The Commonwealth" at a luncheon to- day in connection .with the opening of a new factory erected at Annandale by Messrs. Beale and Co. He reviewed
the work of the session, and stated that in seven months Parliament had passed 14 Acts, not one of which could have been passed without federation by any State. H there was justification to be found for a Federal Government, it lay in that fact. He ventured to eny that in the subjects it had dealt with and was dealing with the Federal Parliament had evidenced the recognition of the largeness and importance of its task, and of the proper way in which to approach that task. He passed an encomium on Major-General Hutton, and said that the Minister of Defence would have a conversation with him before the Defence Bill went into com- mittee. He expressed a hope that the measure would be dealt with before Par- liament prorogued. The debates on legislative questions had been character- ised by a really marked consideration and courtesy for the feelings of others, except in one or two exceptional cases. He thought it was 'a Parliament upon which they might congratulate them- selves for keeping these things down to what might be called the irreducible minimum. The Commonwealth Par- liament might sa<- of itself-if not with pride, with reasonable self-respect I that it had been true to the ideals of
the pe.ople who sent it to its work. The proposer of the toast had been.good enough to allude to the spirit of integ- rity which animated the Commonwealth Government. If there was any rogue in that Government he (Mr. Barton) must be the only one, for he had never sat among a group of colleagues who showed more single-hearted interest in the future of Australia. To say there 1 had been a dead set on one side more
than another, was one of those false- hoods compounded in the distillery which had turned out muoh poisonous stuff in the past. With regard to the federal capital, the Ministry had not 6pared ef- fort or let opportunity pass for a solu- tion of the question. (A Voice : Why not make it m Svdnev P) The place in which a State Parliament was sitting was, in his belief, no place for the per- manent location of the federal capital and Parliament, and that applied to both Sydney and Melbourne. The fe- deral seat of Government ought to be the centre of national federal feeling, as in Washington and Ottawa, and wherever federation was successful. Men
whose prejudices were in favour jpf Syd- ney or Melbourne must give up their pre i'udico. When the Australian capital
lad to be chosen decrees and laws must be framed with an Australian, and not a proviuciaL spirit.
CABLE SCHEMES.
Tlie Postmaster-General and Air. W. Warren, general manager in Australasia for the Eastern Extension Telegraph Company, met yesterday morning to dis- cuss the terms upon which the company would be prepared to substitute a uni- form Commonwealth agreement for the existing State contracts in regard to the Cape cables. Senator Drake asked Mr. Warren for important information re- specting the cable rates, and the latter will have to apply to his board of direc- tors in London before replying. As the holiday season begins immediately, Mr. Warren told Senator Drake that he did not expect to receive any answer from his board before next week, and the Postmaster-General, when he is furnish- ed with the information he seeks, in- tends to lay it before tho Cabinet before I proceeding further with the negotia-
tions. As the Cabinet will probably not meet again until the 14th January, I this menas that nothing definite can oc
I cur before that date.
ALIEN IMMIGRATION.
A deputation representing the Chinese residents of tho city waited upon the Attorney-General yesterday to ask if, in the event of the Immigration Restric- tion Bill being assented to by His Excel- lency the Governor-General, it would re- peal the State Chinese Restriction Acts. Mr. Deakin confirmed what was stated in the "Argus" yesterday, by saying that it was the intention of the Ministry to keep the two sets of laws in operation concurrently. The deputation then asked the Attorney - General if he thought that the State Acts were opera- tive along the borders of the States to which they applied, and Mr. Deakin, while not giving a legal opinion as At- torney-General, replied that in his opinion they still controlled immigra- tion between the States. Other legal members of the House of Representa- tives hold that since intercourse be- tween the States is now "absolutely free" the State Acts do not apply to in tornal migration.
The Attorney-General believes that the Governor-General wi'.l finally deoide to assent to the Immigration Restric- tion Bill on reacliing Perth.
»rriiKPRETINGFËDERAL LAWS.
Although the Commonwealth cannot yet be made a party to an important suit, except with the consent of the Federal Ministry, there are many minor matters concerning Federal laws upon which the State Courts may adjudicate. Stato law«, too, are abrogated whenever they come in conflict with Federal statutes, so that the judiciaries of the several States have to make themselves acauainted with all Commonwealth Acts. For this purpose the Federal Ministry furnishes all State judges with copies of
Federal statutes.
TATTERSALLS SWEEPS.
Although the Post and Telegraph Act gives the Federal Ministry power to de- tain letters addressed to "Tattersall's," or any other 6weeo promoter by procla- mation, Ministers have no immediate in- tention of availing themselves of the Act to drive Tattersall's out of Tasmania. As a matter of faot. provisions similar to those in the Federal Act were in most of the State Acts, but they were never employed as a means to "move on" Tat- tersall's. In each instance in which sweep promoters have been compelled to leave a State it has been by an anti gambling law, which gave the Ministry of the day no option in the matter. The sections of the Post and Telegraph Act« which gave this power have been used mainly to suppress clairvoyants, fortune- tellers, astrologists, and other people who have attempted to make a livelihood out of tho credulity of some of the pub- lic. ,
PUBLIC SERVICE INCREMENTS.
In cases where officers of the Federal Public Service have statutory rights to definite increase of salary from 1st July last they are being; paid, but the Min- istry has determined that no other in- crements shall be paid until the estim- ates have been passed. A large number of junior officers in the general and. other divisions of the Postal Department have not received an" increments this year, but it is intended that they shall receive them when they have been ap- proved by Parliament, and they will date back to 1st July or the date when they became due.
THE TARIFF.
Sir William Lyne, in proposing the
toast of "Australian Industries" at the opening of a -new. factory *t Armidale to-dav. claimed that the federal tariff was giving confidence to capita} and enterprise, and, 1 despite/the - attacks
which; liad basti ísvaUÍa »tit, it "had not
I : MR. BARTON'S VIEWS. ,
Speaking at the« same meeting, Mr.. Barton said that there was no one who went to any meeting he held before the federation of .the colonies who could, hare left the hall in'which he spoke with any doubt as to what his fiscal creed was. He feared there were some gen- tlemen in-the Hotue:of Representative» representing,.the ,smaller States who. were moving for a-, reduction of-the* revenue duties, in blissful ignorance of the result to the States from which they came. But the 'revenue arm of the tariff must be retained, not merely for the sake of one State, but for the sake of all Australia, to whom the embarrass- ment of one Stato was a serious danger. If anv one of these States were put in a position that it was not able to perform its obligations, that would not b* doing a fair thing to that State or to the Com- monwealth, which must suffer with it. It was as much to the interest of one State as to Australia to see that the solvency of the States must be main- tained, even if thev had ta be-maintain- ed with« larger tariff than was necessary
to meet the wants of each of the other States. Time and experience would vindicate the Ministry on the subject of the tariff, and he left it to time and ex- perience with as much confidence now as at any time in the past. He belioved Ministers bad endeavoured to keep, and had in conscience and spirit kept, the pledges they made to the people. Of course, if there was a man. »ho at the time of uttering a pledge pHt forward a wrong rending of it, then he must be welcome to his wretched little satisfac- tion.