The Times. Published on Tuesday and Friday Afternoons. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1921. INLAND WATERWAYS.

Franklin Times, Volume 9, Issue 692, 13 December 1921, Page 4

The Times. Published on Tuesday and Friday Afternoons.

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1921. INLAND WATERWAYS.

The long-expected report of the Inland Waterways Commission has at last been presented to Parliament, and though the actual text of the document has not yet reached us, the telegraphed extracts give us a fairly good view of the general trend of the recommendations. Naturally it is the portion dealing with the Waikato River and its tributaries that the readlers of the “Times” are most interested, and we propose to coniine our remarks to that portion of the report.

“We nothing extenuate, nor aught set down in malice.”

Wo may fairly claim that no other journal has taken so deep an interest or adopted so consistent an attitude towards the problems concerned in the handling of the Waikato as the “Times,’’ and it is a matter of no little gratification to us to see the

theories we have consistently urged during the last nine years confirmed in their entirety by the Commissioner’s report. The two first issues of the “Times”—published long before it came into the handls cf the present proprietors—contained two arresting articles by Mr' Wily, in which he drew attention to the fundamental errors underlying the River Board’s scheme of work, and pointed out not only that the object arrived! at could not be attained by their methods,, but that injury to both navigation and drainage would follow. Our readers will remember the long and bitter fight that followed, in which Mr Wily, at first singlehanded, finally succeeded in impressing his views upon all except a few irreconcileables.

The “Times” nas always endeavoured to impress upon the public that the Waikato and its tributaries were a separate entity, and the continual efforts that were made to tangle them up with expensive and ambitious canal schemes was only in jurying the prospect of anything being done for the already existing waterways. The Commission has adopted this view, and recommends that the whole Waikato water-shedl shall be put under the control, of a Board consisting of two Government appointees, one of whom shall be an engineer, with four members representing the counties of Franklin Waikato Raglan, '.and Waipa, and one member representing the Boroughs in the district. This Boai’d is to have full powers of control over navigation and land drainage, and to supersede the present Waikato River Board, which the Commission states has wholly failed to improve the river 'either for navigation or landdrainage. This is much the kind of Board the “Times” has always recommended for the control of the river,. We have always argued that it should contain appointed members with a a settled tenure of office in addition to elected members, in order that a continuous policy of river-training might be carried out. The problems connected with the handling of the Waikato are so complex and puzzling that they can only be properly dealt with by men who have given years to a proper understanding of them. The appointed members will be of immense service to a Board which must to seme extent suffer from lack of experience in the work to be undertaken.

A conference is shortly to be held at Ngaruawahia to consider the report, and to take such action as may bo deemed advisable. We trust it will be a fully representative gathering, worthy of the importance of the subject that gives occasion for it.