DELEGATION OF GOLDFIELDS POWERS.

Evening Star, Issue 2972, 28 August 1872, Page 4

DELEGATION OF GOLDFIELDS POWERS.

In one of the Parliamentary Papers recently published is a letter by Mr Lowther Broad, Warden at Keefton, which reads very much like a lecture to the Assembly on the present policy regarding goldfields I desire to place on record (says Mr Broad) my firm conviction that there is no longer any necessity for the delegation of the powers under the Goldfields Act to Superintendents. With tne easy means of communication now in existence, with the whole local machinery of the goldfields in perfect working order under Wardens of considerable experience there is nothing that a Superintendent is called upon to do which could not be done quite as easily from Wellington. And the advantages of this would be a uniform system for the whole Colony, and a Minister responsible to Parliament for the general administiatiou of the goldfields as a whole. I feel sure this general system would be far more acceptable to the miners and others on the goldfields than the present one, provided some simple means be found by which the granting of mining and agricultural leases can be dealt with without delay. I would suggest that a Warden in each Province should be called Chief Warden, and have the power to grant these leases. I should have hesitated to place my opinion on this subject on record were it not tor the fact that, during eleven years’ residence ou the New Zealand go’dfields, I have never heard anyone say a good word for the present system. The opinion of the residents on the goldfields, I firmly believe, has always been that the present divided responsibility was most vexatious and inconvenient, and that the powers ought to be vested solely either in the Province or in the Colony.