THE WAIMAKARIRI.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 19160, 17 November 1927, Page 11

THE WAIMAKARIRI.

TO TEE JDIIOB OF THS FBBSS. , 9ir < —May I trespass on your valuabli . space to contradict Mr Manhire's state ; ments at yesterday's meeting of the . Waimakariri River Trust, viz., "Thai [ they should not spend all the ratepayers' money on the protection oi i Wright's property. No less than £3OOO ■ had been spent on the bank last year. Their land had been flooded for 60 \ years, and it was no new thing." This must be a pet saying of his, as everv time that bank comes up for discus"sion he uses it. Wright's property has not been subjected to floods for the last 60 years, as their top land was , always dry—it being about the onlv dry land in the . district in the 1868 flood—until the water was confined between high banks above them, and concentrated on to theirs. The water which flooded them formerly was "back water," on the lower land near the Ijorth road, which backed over after Grieg's Drain was filled up from the break very much further up than their place. I am very greatly surprised to see Mr Manhire's statement, after hearing a deputation of seven farmers. Perhaps the others, than the Wrights, were there for an outing when they stated their own cases. In concluding I should like to ask him why the lower Kaiapoi Island land should be the scapegoat for the rest, and extend to him an invitation to come out and we shall be pleased to show him where the water went for the last 60 years.—Yours, etc. EWARP R. WRIGHT. ' Willow Bank, Kaiapoi, Nov. 16th.