THE OKAIN'S BAY ROAD BOARD V. J. DALGLISH.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume V, Issue 488, 22 March 1881, Page 2

THE OKAIN'S BAY ROAD BOARD V. J. DALGLISH.

To the Editor.

Sir,—l feel that some apology is almost necessary for obtruding on the attention of the public matters that are personal to myself, and a local.body in whose district I happen to be a ratepayer. The fact that the question at issue between myself and the Board are susceptible of a wider than a merely local application, and are fraught with issues affecting the whole colony must be my excuse for in this column addressing you. And although the matters in dispute between myself and the Board have been judicially settled, in one case, that of my objection to the Valuation Roll, without the possibility of appeal, still such questions are none the worse of being reviewed in the High Court of public opinion.

It is especially enacted by an Act of the General Assembly of New Zealand of what the short title is " The Eating Act 1876," "That it shall not be lawful for any local body after the 31st day of March 1877 to make any rate, except under the provisions of this Act (sec. 35). It is at the same time a doctrine, and a very salutary one, that all magistrates in the exercise of their judical functions have no discretion but to interpret a statute strictly in the same way in which a judge of the Supreme Court would do. I do not of course refer to any case in which there might be any ambignity in the construction of the Act. My case is the plain question not what is the legaT meaning of the 6th schedule-to the, Act quoted, but what is its simple shape. The schedule referred to contains a form" of ratebook. This form the law says shall . be followed (sec. 39). But lie Okain's Bay Koad Board rise superior to Parliament and ignore the whole directions r of . the Jaw. They neither have a rate book, nor follow the schedule, and the Resident Magistrate characterises this as a trifling irregularity which ought to be overlooked in out of the way places like Okain's. Everj one is quite well aware rates mv p be paid, but what I wish is that the proper steps should be taken in securing the payment of them, and in this I am baulked in my only object in bringing the ques J tion before the Court by its decision.

Knowing the fact positively that the Valuation.List for 1881 was not prepared in terms of the Act, I lodged an objection to that effect with the sole-view of correcting the irregularity. I pleaded the general objection that the list in question was not in terms of the 2nd schedule to the Act, and gave evidence that on the day of the meeting of the Board in January it was not signed and declared nor numbered, consecutively from one upwards, and delivered to the local body on January 15th. I was not quite sure as to the date

of the Board's meeting, and asked for the minutes of the proceedings, as every fatepayer is entitled to under the 127 th section of "The Canterbury Koads Ordinance 1872." The minute book was, of course, not forthcoming. Messrs Moore and Barker gave evidence, not on oath, that the meeting took place on a day between the lOih and 15ih of January, whereas I have since ascertained that the meeting at which the roll was unsigned was the 29th of January, U days afier the proper date, and indeed the Le Bon's Bay part waa never signed. After taking this prelim

inaiy objection, which one would have

imagined must be fatal, I lost my opportunity of objecting to any other matter in

the list. My evidence was given on oath, and was pr.-ictically uncontradicted, still the Judge of the Assessment Court overruled the objection and signed, not only one roll but three rolls, one purporting to be for Okain's, one for Little Akaloa, and one for Le Boti's, and numbering this last himself. As no such subdivisions are known to the law the making of such is a

fresh irregulariiy. Okain's Bay District

being described in the 2nd schedule to " The Canterbury Roads Ordinance, 1872 " as one portion of the province, indeed under the Ordinance quoted, sub-divisions are not contemplated at all, consequently in the words of " The Rating Act" there is but one list for the whole district. When the nest ratu is made we shall be landed in this anomaly, that it will be itn ■ possible for a legal rate book to follow as required by the Act, an illegal raluation roll; aud when the proper time cornea I shall t ke the opportunity of again raising the point. It is a great pity that these inegulaiities are allowed to occur, as once give either local bodies or their officers an inch and the proverbial ell is sure to follow. The moral sense of a public body gets blunted, like that ot an individual, and we

have as the result the irregulaaities that

the Provincial District Auditor,'Mr Olliveir, complains of in reference to the conduct of this Board's affaire and its officers, while in Okain's the other and which I understand that officer has referred to head quarters.—l am, etc., /

JAMES DALGLISH.