TOWN EDITION. The Daily Telegraph WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1881.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3186, 14 September 1881, Page 2

TOWN EDITION. The Daily Telegraph WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1881.

Although we are not authorised in any way to say that Mr T. Tanner is likely to be a candidate for the representation of Napier at tbe next elections, we are well enough aware that in the event of his comiDg forward iv that capacity, he may be assured of a large measure of support. Mr Tanner has no reason to think that he possesses a less qualification to represent a Hawke's Bay constituency than any one who has gone before him. He has the education, the wealth, and leisure that wealth brings to enable him to devote the attention and the time to public affairs. In the very prime of life, he is nevertheless an old settler, known personally to almost every elector in this provincial district, and for very many years has taken an active part in the local government of the province. He is morever a fairly good public speaker— perhaps a trifle too verbose—but possessing no such faults that a little more practice would not rectify. But of all qualifications that should commend Mr Tanner to the electors is the fact that he is a thorDUghly local man. He makes his money here and spends it here ; and spends it liberally too. Unlike too many of our large land owners, there is nothing that is required on his stations what he does not buy in Napier. He is one ot those who has helped to make Hawke's Bay one of the most flourishing portions of the colony ; he looks upon Hawke's Bay as his home and the home of his children, and in all these respects he may be truly regarded as a thoroughly representative man. Thoroughly acquainted with the administration of our local institutions Mr Tanner has been keen enough to discover the flaws that impede their successful working, and knows in what direction amendments should take. He is in fact an advocate of a modified system of provincialism— a system that Mr Sutton has assserted he cannot understand. Mr Tanner can tell him, and when the time comes no doubt will enlighten him on the Bubject. A member of the County Council, of the Harbor Board, the Waste Lands Board, and the Education Board, he knows thoroughly well that the same men are very nearly on the same Boards, and could do the work of each just as well as though they were called by the same name, and had but one secretary and treasurer between them. Mr Tanner has not disguised bis views upon this subject. He ia of opinion that if the two counties of Waipawa and Hawke's Bay had been under the administration of one council there could not have been the wretched management that has been so conspicuous in the Waipawa district. The number of members who would be in a large council uninterested in the petty jealousies of particular localities would prevent the influence ot miserable spite in the allocation of funds, aDd would insist upon the work of tbe county being efficiently carried out. A Council entrusted with the administration of a large county, and possessing the duties that now devolve upon the Harbor, the Waste Lands, the Education, and the Hospital Boards, would attract the services of the best men in the country, and be the means of saving large sums of public money that are now frittered away in the maintenance of half a-dozen staffs of officials where one would be sufficient. The question of local government is one that concerns all classes to a much greater extent than perhaps any other in connection with public affairs, and it should be made the great question at the next elections. Men who hold liberal views upon the points involved upon that question should certainly not hide their light under a bushel, and therefore, we hope that Mr Tanner will present himself as a candidate for the suffrages of the electors.