The Dominion. TUESDAY, JUNE 7, 1910. LOCAL GOVERNMENT.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 836, 7 June 1910, Page 4

The Dominion. TUESDAY, JUNE 7, 1910. LOCAL GOVERNMENT.

There is no particular in which England differs more distinctly from other countries 'than in the sturdiness of its municipal life. Centuries have gone to the creation of the civic patriotism of Englishmen, and it is probably to its system of local government that Great Britain owes the sanity and stability that have accompanied her vast expansion in the last half century. Englishmen have always been keen to keep the management of their local concerns in' local hands, and they are to-day more jealous than ever of the integrity of local self-government, and more earnest than ever in their desire to make municipal politics worthy of pursuit by the best kind of citizens. By many prominent Englishmen membership of tho governing body of a great corporation is regarded as not inferior in honour to membership of the House of Commons, and superior in its opportunities for valuable work. We are very far indeed from that condition of affairs in this country, where almost anybody is considered fit to assist in some branches of local government and where the public does not greatly concern itself with local affairs. The difference between New Zealand and England in this matter is what will impress tho average New Zealandcr who reads the reports of the annual meeting of the Association of Municipal Corporations held in London towards the end of April. The annual dinner of the Association was specially notable for a speech by the Prime Minister in reply to a toast proposed by an ex-Mayor of Eastbourne, who was no less a person than the Duke of Devonshire.

Local self-government in England as it now exists began to take shape 75 years ago, and during these 75 years two processes have gone on, as Mr. Asquith explained. ' "First they had seen tho annexation by the great and growing and progressive urban municipalities of new areas of territory, of new provinces of jurisdiction, and the development under tho moulding guidance of. men like Loud Onslow and his predecessors of a complete code of municipal law. ' Side by side with that process and as a necessary incident of it they had seen set up what might almost be described as an impcrium in impcrio. Tho central Government, 70, 80,..0r 100 years ago, was in local as well as in Imperial, mattors omnipotent. It was not his experience that municipalities now came as suppliants to Parliament. They approached them in Parliament and at Whitehall in an attitude not of supplication, he would not say of dictation,.but with an attitude at any rate of conscious equality." Nothing can illustrate better the profound difference between the view which British statesmen take of local government and the view taken by Now Zealand politicians than tho difference between tho subjects of negotiation between the Parliament and the municipalities in the two countries. In England the conflict between the two authorities is almost always concerned only with questions of finance; in New Zealand the municipalities are less concerned with finance in dealing with tbo Government than with the defence of their lives and freedom. The most serious problem in local government at Home, according to_Mn. Asquith, is "tho true regulation of tho relations between local and Imperial finance. Until," he went on, "they had settled upon something like scientific and rational lines what services ought to' be locally paid for, and what services ought to be centrally and Imperially paid for, they would never ■ got a true settlement.''' But, it must be added, so long as that is the only grave issue so long will England enjoy the enormous iienefits of a vigorous municipal life.

Although in England everybody is agreed upon the wisdom of giving the freest play to the local spirit in i the administration of local affairs and the custody of local interests —so much agreed that the fact is not often stated—Me. Asquith made express reference to this important principle. Since the municipalities in this Dominion are constantly menaced by the.* unsleeping eagerness of the Government to absorb the powers, abridge the functions and curtail the freedom of local bodies in general and of city and borough councils in particular, Mr. Asquith's words have a special value. "What was it," he said, "that the municipalities of the country, which they represented, contributed to the common stock of public utility 1 There was first the elasticity which municipal life allowed. There was an independence, an initiative, and a power of. variation among their municipal bodies, which, if they were under the dominating or autocratic control of some central authority, would be impossible, and which was of the utmost benefit to the public." This passage makes a useful commentary upon the New Zealand Government's attempt to deprive the cities of all real control of their tramways—an attempt which there is good reason to believe will lie made again. There is no feature of English life that can be more profitably copied in New Zealand than this vigorous _ municipal spirit. Should' the public become—we might say remain—apathetic, it will be impossible to check the centralising of all government, and it hardly needs to be pointed out that this will be a very ev.il thing, and especially evil in a country in which the central Government is not Parliament, but the Ministry. What must be remembered by the people who are opposed to the destruction of true local government is that powers once conceded to the central autocracy can almost never be recovered.