RIGHT TO GOVERN

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 58, 6 September 1926, Page 8

RIGHT TO GOVERN

LOCAL GOVERNMENT AND MUNICI-

PAL TRADING.

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —One ventures to express the opinion that your correspondent •in his article in your issue of Friday last, when referring to the. much wider range of municipal activities in the younger towns of the Dominions as compared with the scope of the work of the corporations at Home is a little confused between two totally different subjects—vi_., local government and municipal trading. He has given an able summary of the activities of the Leeds Corporation, but a reference to the quoted Municipal Year Book of England and Wales will show that there are some fifty or more county boroughs in England and Wales comparable in size with our New Zealand cities, practically all of which have either gas, water, electric, or tramway undertakings and maintain the other . institutions referred to by. your correspondent. In addition, there are some hundreds of non-county boroughs and urban districts whose activities in the direction of municipal trading are of no mean order. My point, however, is that local government and municipal trading are two very different subjects. Have we really any local government.. The activities of our councils are confined almost solely to municipal trading, maintenance of sewers, roads, open spaces, and libraries. Ou/'municipal authorities are neither concerned in the administration of the police and its cognate mailers of shop hours, weights and measured food and drugs, etc. They have no voice in education, either technical or elementary, and little say in the more important matters of health and housing. All these subjects are the concern of the cities and boroughs of England and Wales, who are, in addition, shortly to be entrusted with the administration of the poor law or charitable aid. Apart from municipal trading, our councils exercise but the powers of the Cinderella of Home local authorities, viz., the rural district council, which also provides sewerage systems and water supplies for the smaller townships and maintains roads. This brief survey leads me to the question, where now is that sturdy local independence which was the boast of our forefathers ? That independence which wrested rights, privileges, and immunities from conquering Kings and fought to retain them against principalities and powers. We are content to have' our local affairs administered by the Government upon whom we gladly place all our burdens, to be passed on jjy them to the bureaucracy; or, if this not be possible, our councils delegate them to yet another specially constituted body still further to increase the incredible number of our boards and committees and administrative staffs. I trust my views will not be deemed carping criticism, but one can see certain writing on the wall, even though it be indistinct. The right to govern once abrogated is difficult to regain so history clearly shows. There is no need slavishly to follow Home precedent, but we do seem to have gone to Germany for a burgomeister rather than to Britain for a .mayor, for •direction and initiation of policy seem rather more in his hands than in those of the council. To have taken American precedents in the nomination of candidates by an electoral body or civic league, in constant appeals to the electors, on matters which the (elected body might well decide, and in having ad hoe bodies retiring every two years, so losing all continuity of policy, and the holding up of questions for a new council to decide. I must, however, not trespass further on your space. One has merely touched the fringe of a wide subject, but surely it must be apparent to all that our local government is not in too healthy a state, and the questions in my mind are not ones of personnel but of system and lack of co-ordin-ation, coupled with a wholesome fear of departmental government.—l am, etc., LEX LOCI. 6th September.