The Globe. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 1874.

Globe, Volume II, Issue 142, 17 November 1874, Page 2

The Globe. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 1874.

In another day or two the usual solemn farce of making the cab byelaw, by means of a special meeting of the City Council, will take place, followed, as matter of course, by an interlude of legal proceedings terminating with an expensive appeal case. In view of the large expenses likely to be saddled upon the already overtaxed ratepayers, it behoves our civic representatives to be extremely cautious that the bantling, now about to be ushered into the world, exposed as it will be to determined onslaughts, is perfectly prepared at all points to resist aggression. We have no wish to prejudge a case in any way, but when it is matter for public comment that the bye-law to be solemnly enacted by the Council next Thursday is utterly useless, and that means will be taken at once to prove its illegality, it is time that some steps should be taken to put a stop to the childish proceedings which, have been going on now for some year or so. During the whole of this time Christchurch has been without licensed passenger vehicles ; there has been no system of supervision; the most blissful state of uncertainty as to what is the fare has prevailed, and judging from appearances, this miserable state of things is likely to continue for some time yet. Surely t here must be some means of enacting a law by which these matters can bo regulated, and if going in the old groove of making a bye-law is so open fo be upset when tested in a court of law, then the sooner some new method of law-mak-ing is tried the better. The question of the shilling or eightcenpence fare is, after alt, the rode upon which the conference between the Council and the cabmen split, and as we said at the time, it did not appear to be an unreasonable demand on the part of the cabmen. One of our contemporaries took up the position that the City Council having fought for the shilling could not now recede, but was bound to maintain it. Now this is an argument which will scarcely hold water, because, with all deference to the sapiency of the Council, we would submit that it is just possible they may be wrong, and if so, there surely can be no disgrace in owning the error and retracing their steps. Be this as it may, however, this is a matter of which the cabmen are perhaps the best judges, as it affects their pockets, but with which at present we have little to do. What we want is to see the public protected, which we think they have a right to demand. The City Council are the representatives of the people, to them is committed the making of necessary laws for their comfort and convenience, and therefore it is not too much to expect that there shall be some check, some slight amount of official supervision over a body of men, to whose care the citizens are perforce compelled to trust their lives, and those of their families. At present this is nob the case, and the City Council occupy the rather undignified position of the monarch who marched his troops up the hill, and then came down again. We have spent any amount of money, valuable time has been wasted, and we have accomplished, what? absolutely and entirely nothing, except it be to expose the weak points in the Act to the keen glance of an astute enemy, who has not been slow to take advantage of the knowledge. The crisis is now come, either the City Council must give way to the request of tlx cabmen, and allow the eighteen penny fare, or they must enforce their byelaw and close the public stands against the non-complying cabbies. There is no middle course, and it will be for them to decide which of these two they wiil take, and we hope that for once they will act with firmness and decision, casting aside that vacillation which has been so marked a trait in the conduct of what has now become one of the causes celeires of Canterbury.