A QUESTION FOR THE LYTTELTON RATEPAYERS.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1919, 19 April 1880, Page 3

A QUESTION FOR THE LYTTELTON RATEPAYERS.

To tho hditor of the QWbe. Sib, —Permit me to call the attention of the JLy ttelton ratepayers, through the columns of your widely circulated paper, to the proposal lately made in reference to the disposition of the library and hall of the Colonists' Society. The committee, as I understand it, propose to offer the property to the Borough Council, who would hold it for the benefit of the town. The library would then possibly be opened at a smaller| subscription iee than heretofore, and the reading-room would be maintained, as formerly, free to the use of sailors and others. Now, Mr Allwright, the Mayor, and some other local magnates, are determined the townspeople Bhall not got possession of the property. They say the ratepayers have no right to it, and shall not, if they can help it, have it. What they propose is virtually to keep it under the control of the select few. The institution they don't say—but report says—has been controlled by a clique for years, and they say we shall take good care "our" property — we who have paid fife shillings every quarter to ; it—"our" property shall not be given away. It is true they might say, but they take good caro not to say it, that they never contributed a penny towards purchasing tho property, but that is nothing in their estimation. That splendid library, and that fine hall for parties, conversaziones, and dramatic shows, will not be permitted to fall into the hands oi the " common herd" if they know it, not without a hard fight. They entirely ignore tho fact that it was the hard cash of the common herd that purchased that property that established it, and by subsidies of from £IOO to £3OO per annum from the Provincial Council kept it going. They forget," to?, that the land it stands upon belongs to tho very people to whom the committee wish to convey the building and horary, namely, to the ratepayers of Lyttelton, and that the ratepayers have never received a penny of rent from that ground for years past, or of rates either, so 'hat about 75 per confc. of the taxpayers in the town have virtually been mado to pay hundreds of pounds towards making up what should have been paid in rent and taxes by the members of the Bociety. For it mußt bo plain that, by exempting this property from ground rent and taxes, the town loses in its income, and the ratepayers havß to meat the defic'ejcy. But if these gentlemen forget the facts the ratepayers don't; nor do the latter forget that some time since an application was made by the managors of the society to the Borough Council for a subsidy or grant from the ratepayers' money, and that at least one gentleman, who is now so loud in his protestations against giving the property into the hands of its rightful owners—the burgesses of the town —that gentleman|was|quiteagreeable to take a portion of the rates to bolster-up an institution carried on by the select few, and from which the bulk of the ratepayers received no benefit whatever. Some other inconsistencies might be pointed out, but in the meantime it will be well for tho taxpayers generally to watch tho outcome of this town property business. I am, &c, RATEPAYER. Lyttelton, April 16,1880.