Debate on The Housing Act

Official report · Assembly of SchwartzistanSession 1974 · col. 15986

The Speaker: The Order of the Day is the third reading of the Bill. The Minister has the floor.

Klara Kreist (Minister of the Interior): I beg to move the third reading of the Bill, and I shall be brief. The Bill is a Bill about drains, roads and lamps, and I shall not dress it up. The towns need it. I read the material clause to the House. Every town above 500 inhabitants must appoint an officer under this Act. I move.

Nadja Wendl (The Ostrand; The Reed Party): Speaker, The land pays for everything in the end. The Reed Party will vote as the land would vote if it could. The towns asked for it. The towns will pay for it. That is the usual arrangement and I do not quarrel with it. The people of The Ostrand will ask what it costs them, and I should like to be able to tell them. I oppose the third reading.

Markus Vogt (The Ostrand; The Reed Party): Speaker, The land pays for everything in the end. The Reed Party will vote as the land would vote if it could. An officer under the Act: the phrase appears in every Bill from the Interior and means a man with a book and a bicycle. My constituents in The Ostrand wrote to me about the Bill, all 4 of them, and they were against it until they read it. The Bill should pass and I shall vote for it.

Dieter Tiendiech (The Sudmark; The Assembly Union): Mr. Speaker, I sit for The Sudmark. The clerks there are few and the roads are long, and any officer the Bill appoints will spend a week finding the houses. The Union stands where it has always stood: for the towns, for the trade, and against any clause that begins with the word 'licence'. I have the Bill before me and the House has it before it. The towns asked for it. The towns will pay for it. That is the usual arrangement and I do not quarrel with it. I oppose the third reading. [The Line!]

Ida Kolm (Norrfeld; The Reed Party): Speaker, The members for the reed districts will ask, as they always ask, what the Bill means for the harvest and the causeways. Drains, roads and lamps. The House will pass the Bill because the alternative is drains, roads and no lamps. In Norrfeld, which I have the honour to sit for, the Bill will be read at the market cross and understood by half. I shall vote against the Bill. [The Line!]

Heinz Marsch (The Sudmark; The Continuity Party): Mr. Speaker, I have read the Bill for what it does to the record, which is the only reading that matters, and it does nothing to the record. The people of The Sudmark will ask what it costs them, and I should like to be able to tell them. An officer under the Act: the phrase appears in every Bill from the Interior and means a man with a book and a bicycle. I have the Bill before me and the House has it before it. I shall vote against the Bill.

The Minister, in reply, said that the points raised were answered in the printed Bill and that the Ministry would consider the rest.

The question being put, a division was called for, and the members went to the lobbies.

The Speaker: The Ayes have it. The Bill is passed and will go to the Grand Chancellor for assent.

The House then proceeded to the next Order of the Day.