Member’s farewell (selected verses)

 

We’ll bow to Mr Speaker and sadly turn the page;

I shan’t forget these members, as south my footsteps roam,

For the pigeon’s on the Miro and now I’m going home.

 

I’ll miss my old opponents on benches ’cross the floor,

I’ll miss those members’ luncheons at Bellamy’s next door;

But when I leave the Chamber and walk away alone,

I’ll leave no hate or rancour, when Westland calls me home.

 

Farewell to all-night sessions and clang of division bell,

When nerves are frayed and tempers displayed,

Sure it’s just like living in hell;

Yet I’ll miss all my fiery colleagues, who fight like gladiators of Rome;

‘Cos the tree ferns shade and the peaceful glade

Whisper, ‘Paddy, it’s time to come home.’

 

 

The game of politics (both verses)

 

To play the game of politics, a member to become,

Learn all the little bag of tricks, and this is how it’s done:

First toady to the Labour crowd, and promise all they ask;

Tell all the women you are proud to undertake the task

Of driving all the liquor out, to make the country pure,

No matter how you turn about whence once your seat is sure.

This simple plan will never fail, Then always be prepared

To slide down from your seat upon a rail, And Join the winning side.

 

The men who ruled the country long, who thought they knew the game,

Who made new laws — some right, some wrong — and spread New Zealand’s fame

For piling law on top of law, till folks became quite puzzled;

The people say they’ll have no more, Joe’s crowd must now be muzzled!

Some were left out in the wet, two Honourables, too!

The Democratic Baronet has fallen in the stew!

 

Breach of privilege (selected verses)

 

You may slang a fellow-member, and your words may be as free

As the phrases of endearment used by mariners at sea;

Indulge in lurid language of a kind that would amaze

An angry bullock-puncher in the old Colonial days ...

You may wreck a reputation from the cover of a hedge,

Or — as politicians term it — Parliamentary privilege ...

These things are merely trifles, only fit to raise a laugh,

But woe betide the journalist who prints a paragraph

Reflecting on the evidence before some committee,

Or some M.H.R. with character of spotless purity

At once Jove’s thunderbolts are launched at his devoted head;

He will wish that scrap of evidence had wisely been unsaid;

For the direful Standing Orders, and the precedents from May

, Remind him of the terrors of the awful Judgement Day;

Of bottomless perdition he stands trembling on the edge,

For this — ye gods! — this paragraph’s a BREACH OF PRIVILEGE.

 

In the ladies’ gallery

 

Up in the ladies gallery

‘Tis curious quite to see

The difference shown by ladies

To ladies of different degree,

If you want a lesson in manners

And have half-an-hour to spare,

Go up to the ladies gallery,

There are patterns of all sorts there.

 

They sit in a row, pretty creatures,

From la dame to the raw girl down,

From the plain looped-up black lustre,

to the sable trimmed velvet gown,

When you enter they eye you coldly,

With a fixed supercilious stare,

You will scarcely believe it, but really

The best of manners grow there.

 

The gallery boys (selected verses)

 

The midnight chimes have rung, the House is getting bare,

But still the ‘Gallery Boys’ toil on, and still the ‘boys’ are there.

Though their eyes may be weary and their fingers be sore,

Their pens they must drive till of talk there’s no more.

 

And then for home and bed through dark deserted street,

Midst sticky mud and slush and driving rain and sleet,

Sometimes no bed until it’s well nigh dawn,

For the ‘stonewallers’ will keep them on well into early morn.

 

Sing Ho! for the Gallery Boys,

The ‘Boys’ who are youths, the ‘Boys’ who are men,

who sit up aloft where oratory cloys,

And ‘graft’ night and day with tireless pen,

Sing Ho! for the Gallery Boys!

 

The alarm (selected verses)

 

They say, and it is quite believed by everyone in town,

The Lords are shaking in their shoes,

The House is tumbling down!

 

A Farmer, with a frighten’d face, amid the council stood,

And from his pocket forth he drew a piece of rotten wood,

‘My Lords and gentlemen’, he said, ‘I’ll bet you half-a-crown,

Before the session’s well begun,

The House will tumble down!’

 

‘Behold I have within my hand a small piece of the roof,

‘Tis like a bit of honeycomb, and far from waterproof;

Soft are our heads, as well you know, soft as the Speaker’s gown

And what think ye will be our fates,

An the House tumble down!’

To the Opposition whip

 

Most noble whip, you’ve done your duty well,

And like a gentleman, as all can tell;

The opposition ladies, all will bless,

Henceforth and for ever, Mr. Whip Ingles.

 

How well you’ve shepherded your wandring flock,

and sav’d the votes of those who, on a rock

Of tipsy folly, had almost been lost,

Which would your mighty schemes have tempest toss’d.