REPORT FROM THE SELECT COMMITTEE

ON THE

NEW CONSTITUTION.

As regards the constitution of the Legislative Council, your committee consider that not only by the terms of their declaration and remonstrance of the 5th December, 1851, but by the letter of agreement to those terms of Sir John Pakington, of the 15th December, 1852, the house is pledged to a constitution "similar in its outline to that of Canada." The subsequent de

The Select Committee of the Legislative Council, appointed on the 20th of May, 1853, to prepare a constitution for this colony, and having had the despatches from Sir John Pakington and the Duke of Newcastle, relative to such constitution, referred to them, bring up a bill and the draft of a proposed Act of the Imperial Parliament which will be necessary to give it legal validity, with the following re-spatch of his successor, the Duke of port:

In submitting the bill "to confer a constitution on this colony, and to grant a civil list to her Majesty," for the adoption of the house the committe appointed this session have found it necessary to suggest some alterations in the measure brought up by the committee of last session, though they fully concur not only in the scheme of legislation recommended by that committee, but also for the most part in the provisions of the proposed Act of Parliament, and the bill to be appended to as a schedule, by which unitedly this new Constitution is to be legalized and established.

The most important alterations that have been made in the measure recommended by the committee of last session, relate to the constitution of the Legislative Council, and the civil list to be granted to her Majesty upon the surrender to the colony of the waste lands and royalties which are at present vested in the crown.

Newcastle, appears indeed to admit of some latitude of discretion on this most important subject. But your committee in their declaration and remonstrance are of opinion, that the offer contained necessarily included a nominated Legislative Council in the first instance, and from this offer, independently of the question whether they are strictly bound by it or not, they see no reason to depart. They desire to have a form of government based on the analogies of the British constitution. They have no wish to sow the seeds of a future democracy; and until they are satisfied that the nominated, or the future elective Council, which they recommend, will not effect the object they have in view, of placing a safe, revising, deliberative, and conservative element between the Lower House and her Majesty's Representative in this colony, they do not feel inclined to hazard the experiment of an Upper House, based on a general elective franchise. They are the less disposed to make the experiment as such a fran

A

chise, if once created, will be difficult to | form one of the strongest inducements

be recalled.

not only to respectable families to remain in this colony, but to the upper classes of the United Kingdom and other countries who are desirous to emigrate, to choose it for their future abode.

In the bill proposed for adoption, your committee, it will be seen, have recommended a very large extension of the elective franchise. They are of opinion that, in addition to the franchise established by the 13 & 14 Vict., c. 59, the right of voting for the election of members of the assembly should be given to all persons having a salary of £100 a year, and to all occupants of any room. or lodging paying £40 a year for their board and lodging, or £10 a year for their lodging only. It is conceived that this enlargement of the franchise in combination with the franchise now existing, will be a very close approximation to universal suffrage.

Your committee have also recommended that the number of members forming the assembly should not exceed the number of the present Legislative Council; and that the eighteen additional elective members, who will be substituted for the nominees, should be

Actuated by these views your committee have introduced into the bill "to confer a constitution on the colony, and to grant a civil list to her Majesty," two clauses, which, to a certain extent, are framed in accordance with analogous clauses to be found in the Imperial Act, 31 Geo. III, c. 31, "for making more effectual provision for the government of the province of Quebec." That act authorizes the crown, whenever it thinks proper, to confer hereditary titles of honor, rank, or dignity, to annex thereto an hereditary right of being summoned to the Legislative Council. Your committee are not prepared to recommend the introduction into this colony of a right by descent to a seat in the Upper House; but are of opinion that the creation of hereditary titles, leaving it to the option of the crown to annex to the tile of the first Patentee a seat for life in such house, and conferring on the original Patentees and their descendants inheritors of their titles a power to elect a certain number of their order to form, in conjunction with the original Patentees then living, the Upper House of Parliament, would be a great improve-distributed among the electoral districts ment upon any form, of Legislative Council hitherto tried or recommended in any British colony. They conceive that an Upper House framed on this principle, whilst it would be free from the objections which have been urged against the House of Lords, on the ground of the hereditary right of legislation which they exercise, would lay the foundation of an aristocracy, which, from their fortune, birth, leisure, and the superior education these advantages would superinduce, would soon supply elements for the formation of an Upper House, modelled, as far circumstances will admit, upon the analogies of the British constitution. Such a house will be a close imitation of the elective portion of the House of Lords, which is supplied from the Irish and Scotch peerage; nor is it the least of the advantages which would arise from the creation of a titled order, that it would necessarily

constituted by the Electoral Act of 1851, in strict accordance with the principle of distribution established by that Act; which, it will be recollected, was settled after the most careful conșideration, aud with a view to a fair and just representation of all colonial interests then subsisting. Your committee are of opinion that the working of this Act, and the result of the divisions on all the leading constitutional questions which have since arisen, have justified the most sanguine anticipations of its supporters.

Your committee, while on this subject, beg also to call the attention of your honorable house to the 17th clause of the bill, which contains a power to alter the present electoral divisions, as well as the apportionment of representatives to be chosen by each, whenever there shall be the concurrence of a majority of the Upper House, and of a majority of two

thirds of the Lower House of the future
Parliament, in favor of any such altera-
tion.
It is conceived that this provision
is ample to meet any possible require-
ments of this kind that may from time
to time arise among the various consti-
tuencies of the colony.

It will be seen, also, that the 40th clause of the bill reserves a full constituent power to alter the proposed form of constitution, whenever there shall be a majority of two-thirds of both Houses of Parliament in favor of any such alteration; reserving to her Majesty the right of assenting to or dissenting from any bill for this purpose that may be presented for the signification of her Majesty's pleasure thereon.

sion of a hope that the liberal provision which your Honourable House has just made for the public service will abundantly shew "that as long as the representatives of the people are entirely free, to grant or refuse according to their deliberate views of the exigencies of the public service, her Majesty's faithful Commons in this colony can never arrive at any other conclusion, than that it is the soundest policy, as well as the truest economy, to maintain that service in the utmost efficiency."

Among the grants enumerated in the civil list, is a fund for pensioning off those officers who now hold offices which may be considered as the responsible offices of the Government, and in which The civil list which your committee vacancies will probably occur as soon as propose to grant to her Majesty is responsible Government, properly so £24,700 less than the civil list recom- called, is introduced, among us. Now, mended by the committee of last session, as there can be no doubt the moment the and £10,200 less than the Parliamentary consolidated revenue of the_colony is grant for that purpose, contained in the placed at the disposal of a Legislative first, second, and third parts of Schedule Assembly, consisting entirely of members A. appended to 13 and 14 Vic., c. 59. elected by popular constituencies, that The cause of this great apparent reduc- responsible Government will take effect, tion is to be found in the elastic and and that one of the first measures under rapidly expanding character of the such a new order of things may be to colony, which, in fact, proves that any displace the actual incumbents of those fixed provision for the various depart- responsible offices-the question arises, ments of goverment must soon become what is the nature and amount of the inadequate, however liberal it may ap- compensation to which these displaced pear at present. Your committee have, functionaries will be entitled, and it will be observed, in all cases made whether they are to be entitled to such the same provision for the salaries of the compensation only when so displaced, or judges and other high officers of the at once and at their own option, the crown which is to be found in the before moment their tenure of office is changed, mentioned schedule to the present Act as it will be, from a tenure dependent on of Parliament, and in some cases, where the pleasure of the Crown to a tenure it was thought just and expedient, have practically dependent on the pleasure of recommended an increase of salary. the Legislative Assembly? It appears Your committee trust that this fact, and to your committee if the offices held by the explanation already given of the these functionaries are, as they contend, reasons which have led them to assign to be considered as abolished offices, and no permanent fund for the departmental upon that ground entitling the holders expenses of the higher offices of the of them to the full compensation which crown, leaving them to be provided is usual in such cases in the mother for in the same way as the ex- country, that at all events the abolition penses of all other departments are, of these offices is not to be deemed comviz., by annual vote-will be deemed plete until the holders of them are actusatisfactory by her Majesty's advisers. ally displaced, and that even then the Your Committee cannot, however, take pensions to be assigned to them as an leave of this subject without the expres-equivalent are to be continued only so