THE GOVERNMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS.

Evening Star, Issue 2993, 21 September 1872, Page 3

THE GOVERNMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS.

\phe telegraphic summary of the Ministerial statement gave rise to the impression that the no'V Government, if they did not intend to reverse altogether the policy of public works conceived and initiated by their predecessors, have in view large notifications which, in a material and vital sense, amount to a reversal. That impression will be strengthened by the extract we give from the fuller report of Mr Stafford’s speech. In it we have a declaration of the course which the Government intend to pursue with regard to public works, and there can be no doubt that it fully bears out the construction which has been very generally put upon it by those who take the trouble to look beyond mere words to the meaning they convey when carefully weighed : - ‘‘With reference to public works, that was to say the works which had been authorised by the House, it was the desire of the Government to see those works completed as soon as there were funds to do so ; but it was strongly evident to them, and he had no doubt the feeling was evident to many members of the House, that there was not now anything like the funds necessary to complete the whole of the lines authorised in the Efihedulo to t|ie Railway Act,'lß/1. The nhes already contracted for, or for which estimates had been received, had absorbed already very considerably more than onehalf— in fact, more nearly approaching three-fourths of the whole of the funds set apart for the construction of the whole of the railways ; that was to say, of the whole of the L*2,000,000, the sum set aside for public works. When the departmental charges, and the interest which had hitherto been charged against the. loan, were added to the works contracted tar, and the estimates of the works yet to be contracted for, and the cost of plant and rolling stock—which he thought the Colony would have reason to rejoice would be obtained before the lapse of any considerable time, at a price much below anything like the estimate of the ex-Ministcr for Public Works—when these charges were made against the public works accounts, it would hg found that a very small sum remained to parry out the works yet be undertaken The Government would, therefore, have to consider what means would have to bo taken to raise the money to complete the works which the Legislature had decided should be constructed sooner or lator. Until the method of raising these funds had been determined, the Government did not propose to enter into any new con. tracts which should involve a larger expendi-

ture than the amount at present available, and in no case whatever would they enter into contracts for amounts beyond those authorised by the Parliament of the Colony. Whatever suras the Legislature might think proper to appropriate for these or any future railways, the Government would pledge itself not to exceed those sums without further reference to the Legislature. The Government proposed, as fast as the work could be entered into, to devote themselves to the expenditure of the L 60.000 voted for roads in the north of Auckland. They would lose no time in inviting tenders, and he might say that they had determined, where they were not embarrassed by existing engagements, to secure all the benefits to the Colony that were to be secured by giving the work out to public competition.”

(For continuation of News we fourth page.)