THE RATEPAYERS’ MEETING.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2414, 1 February 1909, Page 7

THE RATEPAYERS’ MEETING.

[To the Editor.] Sir, —in your footnote to my letter tearing: your last issue you state %\)cre assertion is valueless, and our correspondent lias omitted to justify lus bitter attack bv giving a single instance of -tjhe unfairness lie al--7 did not do so tlien because of tbe length of my letter, and for the reason that there were so many omissions and untrue statements in your report that I feared I would be trespassing too much on your readers’ time and “patience if I attempted to deal with the wholes of them in a single letter. Lest some of your readers who " were not at the meeting may not credit my statement I will give you a few items which struck me as unfair. In. the first place you report the Mayor as stating that the town was now rated at 2s lOd. or 2d under the limit. This should read “Is lOd and 2d under the limit.” This is calculated to mislead the uninitiated reader. An important question was asked the Mayor about doing away with the deep and dangerous ditches in Stout and other streets., and the Mayor explained that this was provided for in the proposals, and they would be done away with if the Road Loan proposal was carried. This you also omit to mention. You also state that it was proposed to spend £IOOO in enlarging the Victoria Domain. This should read: Clearing and improving 11 acres in Childers Road. Victoria Domain was leased by a former Council to someone else, - consequently it would be unfair and improper to spend public money on it during the currency of the lease, and Mr. Lysnar never proposed to do so. Your figures are wrongly quoted on the drainage rate. You omit to show the credit balance from the roads proposal available towards drainage. And you have deliberately omitted the 'Mayor’s statement >as to the amount of tlio drainage rate providing no savings were made on the roads. You make no meittion that the Town Clerk’s figures show that there would be a saving made in the roads proposal of over £30,000 in 8 or 9 years. The Mayor clearly showed in dealing with roads that at the worst it only meant a sixpenny rate—a fact which it was extremely import-" ant that your readers should know in order to give an intelligent vote upon it, but a fact which you omit and ignore. Further, you emphasise every remark made by the opponents of the proposals, but you ! entirely omit to montion Mr. Crawford s or Mr. Leydon’s remarks, and both gentlemen, were strongly to the point. Mr. Crawford’s remarks were of grave importance to the whole of the community, yet you omit these whilst you have plenty of room for the twaddle of the opponents. If any further proof of your unfairness were needed you have only to look in the news column of to-day’s issue in which you quote the insolent remarks of an employer before the Magistrate’s Court yesterday, but you make no mention of the reply of the Inspector of Factories, nor do you show. how the said employer was judicially sat upon by Mr. Barton. I could go further and quote numerous other instances to the point, but I think I have said enough, to show that you are untruthful, unfair, injaccurate and totally unreliable.—l am CtX '’ W. MADDISON. Gisborne, Jan. 29. ' [Our correspondent’s wisdom in accepting our challenge to prove the serious charges lie made in Friday s

issue may be judged by the following replies to the specific instances of alleged untruthfulness and unfairness that arc now set forth. The general rato for-the whole of the borough is not Is lOd, but 2s lOd, and the Mayor was not likely to make the mistake of putting it a shilling less, as suggested by our correspondent. Possibly our correspondent, like many other of Air. iLysnar’s supporters, is unaware that His Worship’s ■discourse on Monday night if fully reported would have occupied from 10 to 12 columns of the paper, and in the condensation that necessarily followed it was obviously impossible, however excellent our intentions, to embrace all the points that might specially appeal to a particular individual as being worthy of publication. The complaint regarding the recreation ground is merely a quibble. The area referred to is usually looked upon as a future extension of the present Domain, when the matter is discussed at Council meetings. Wc are accused of deliberately omitting the Mayor’s figures on the drainage question, whereas we devoted over a. column to them on the morning of the meeting. Surely it is not seriously urged that they should have been republished the next day! Our report contains the Alayor’s statement about the 6d rate for roads which our correspondent alleges we “omit and ignore.” Under ordinary circumstances we should have been glad to have given publicity to the remarks of Alessrs Crawford and Leyden, but the exigencies of space rendered this impossible. In regard to the of an employer of labor in the Alagistrate’s Court, we did not deem it necessary to report the reply of tlio Inspector of Factories nor the remarks of the Alagistrate, for the simple reason that they had no hearing on the point to which attention was drawn. Air. Barton made no comment on the remarks of the employer which we quoted, and. our correspondent has obviouslv been misinformed. We are desirous of giving our correspondent every opportunity to substantiate the wild charges lie Jus made against the conduct of tins paper, which is open at all tunes 101 the public expression of diverse views on public matters, but would suggest that before advancing further instances of our journalistic mendicity lie should make himself more full acquainted with the facts. Ed. G.x.|