INCONSISTENCY OF THE AKAROA COUNTY COUNCIL.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume 4, Issue 352, 2 December 1879, Page 2

INCONSISTENCY OF THE AKAROA COUNTY COUNCIL.

To the Editor of the Akaroa Mail

Sir,—Your issuo of Friday last contains matter of grave interest, especially those hard times, to the ratepaying community in Akaroa County. The present financial state of two (at least) of the Road Boards within the County, and the County Council plunging into that well-known vortex called regrading, suggests the questions what line or kind of policy does the County Council intend acting upon ? Do they mean or intend to usurp the powers and functions of the Road Boards, or have they any policy at all beyond the carrying out of a little scheme here and a little fad there to meet or suit the whim of this, that or the other member who may button-hole his scheme into sufficient favor to have the thing carried without either 'f rhyme or reason." It does seem so very strange that in the present day, when we are so continually boasting of our enlightenment and our English fair- i play, that a body of fairly intelligent men could be brought together who would I

affirm a principle, and in the very next breath cast the same to the winds and act directly opposite, and I ask for what purpose ? Was it because there was neither justice nor truth in the assertions of Mr George Armstrong ? to whose letter I am alluding, and the subsequent action of the County Council in agreeing to re-grade what is called the Summit line. Or is this so-called Summit line the most important work which the County Council could ferret out of the very many desirable works on the Peninsula? Or is it as Mr Armstrong very pointedly puts it, that the Road Boards having grown weak from hugging the calf so long the County Council finds herself vigorous enough to relieve the nurse, thinking it might be pleasant carrying the burthen for a while. If the summit road is so badly graded that it has to be re-graded, what is the object in so doing unless it be with a view to its formation, and if the Okain's Road Board has to refund the cost, why in all conscience could not the same principle have been applied to the extension of the Balguerie road to open up Mr Armstrong's property, and charge the same to the Akaroa and Wainui Road Board District. But would it not have been far better and wiser and easier to have apportioned the County funds in.a pro rata distribution amongst the different Road Boards of the County, leaving it to those bodies who levy and collect the road rates, to see that equal justice is done to every portion of the several districts.

Hoping this letter may provoke further discussion, I remain, yours, &c,

A RATEPAYER.