Railway Reform.

Let us take another subject, for I want tonight to give you a comprehensive idea in a few words of my general views on politics. You will have noticed that I issued to you, at the very start of my campaign, an address in which I stated my political faith. I will just say a few words with regard to some of the more important points on which you may wish information. Before we leave the subject of the land and native industries I will just say a word about railway reform. You will see that I insist upon and intend to ardently support a trial of Vaile's railway system. (Applause.) That system I have studied very carefully, and whilst I am a very cautious man — and a practical man, although I say it yet I am perfectly satisfied that there is a really good prospect of success in applying Vaile's system to the passenger traffic of the railways, and that it must have a trial Even if it did show a loss, that loss at the very outside, even if there were no increase of traffic, and an increase is certain, would not exceed about £22,000 by applying it for twelve months to the Auckland section. Some of the other parts of the colony might say, if we did have a loss, that it was an unfair thing for Auckland to have the advantage of cheap fares at the expense of the colony. But I say "No" for several reasons. It is absolutely necessary, in order to set it at rest, that the experiment must be of a kind to thoroughly test the system in every possible way. In the second place, if any part of the colony has a right to any benefit resulting from the trial of the system, I say it is the part of the colony in which lives the man who discovered the system, and who has spent so many years of his life in advocating it against immense difficulties—that is the district above all others in which it should be tried. (Applause.) Then again, the whole Auckland system of lines is so cut off from other lines, that no other main line offers the same advantages for the purpose of the trial. Here it can be tried without en tailing confusion on any of the traffic of the Main Trunk lines. There is a suggestion which I intend to make with regard to this system if you send me to Wellington, as I fully believe you will. In addition to giving twelve months' trial of the system in Auckland, I would, in order to improve its chances, give to every settler who was induced during the twelve months to build a house outside of Auckland, or to settle on a farm, the right for himself, his wife, and his children, to travel for life on the railway at Vaile's rates. That will at once show whether that system will encourage, as Mr Vaile contends it will, and as I believe it will, people to build in the suburbs, and farmers to take up land further away. And the loss to the country would be nil, for you will find that the additional traffic induced by Vaile's rates will go to make up additional revenue, because people will be encouraged to build in the country who would not do so but for that system. It is a reasonable suggestion, and commends itself to my mind, and will give Mr Vaile something like a fair chance, because we want to see, not what his system will do for a year if applied under unfair conditions, but what it will do if we adopt it altogether.