NELSON PROVINCIAL COUNCIL.

Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1188, 20 May 1872, Page 2

NELSON PROVINCIAL COUNCIL.

(from our own correspondent.) Nelson, May 11.

You may think, Mr Editor, that your correspondent is chargeable with remissness, as eleven days have elapsed since" the, Council congregated, yet he has communicated nothing, except by wire, as to the. progress, of. proceedings. . The remiss-, ness is more apparent than real. . ,The truth is that "story there was none to tell." A simple sum in addition, regarding days for church-going and days fpr horse-racing, will reveal the fact that in these eleven days there have been four holidays, three of them of an exceptional character such as no religious or racing community or Council would think of ignoring. Then much of the business of the Council was necessarily formal — preliminaries to the usual programme of committee meetings and so on. Then again the breath of the Council— whereby 1 mean its eloquence — was taken away by the dry-as-dust Bills being presented to it, with the intimation by the Provincial Solicitor that they niust be dis-' cussed and passed by the 16th, else, like other " enterprises of pith and moment," they would "turn awry and lose the name of action." These were the Highways Bill and the Town Improvement Bill. It is upon them that the time, the temper, the intelligence, and the dulness of the Council have beea exhausted during the eleven days afore-mentioned, and, if virtue has its regular ; reward, both Bills ought to be workable and useful, for every clause of each has been faithfully and fairly discussed. Their ■applicability to the, jGro.ld. JFields is... even ..now, however,, doubted. In drafting the Bills there had evidently been not the slightest cohsidera^ tion given to the exceptional circumstances of the Gold Fields, and it was only by the intervention of the Gold Field members that the measures were licked into something like a shape suitable to both the agricultural and auriferous districts. Some .are even of opinion that, as. passed,. the.twp Bills are unsuited to the peculiarity of the situation on the West Coast, but my humble individual opinion is that the statement is made, in a carping spirit, and that both K.oad Boards and Town Boards, may now be created on the Nelson Gold Fields under these enactments, and 'be found to be easily operative and highly valuable institutions. Such amendments as were made in the measures to adapt them to the Gold |Fields are due in. part to the action of your local members, Messrs Kynnersley and Guinness, who are acting with all; the freshness which is usually attributed to " new brooms." ; On the opening day,' the Council, ;-I believe, presented a "sorry spectacled" The public 7 was hot conspicuously represented, and thß representatives of several constituencies were conspicuous by their absence. All, however, have since taken their places except the member for the Amuri, which "scorns the haction" of returning a representative to the Nelson Provincial Council. ' ' Nritwilhr standing which, -and as a heaping of coals upon Amuri's head, the Government introduced a motion, out of the regular course, by which L 750 were voted for the repair of Hurunui Bridge, and the Council passed it without a murmur. Amuri may yet be lost to the Province, but, by the joint action of the Canterbury and Nelson Governments, its great grie{superintendents speech you have probably by this time taken the liberty oi forming your own opinion. Judging by the numbers of paragraphs relating to the Gold Fields, the interest taken" in the prosperity of the population there, on the part of the .Nelson Government, is really extraordinary. One would imagine that the progress of the Gold Fields was a subject which occupied the. earnest attention oi the Governmeut all the year round. Some -vulgar fellow unfortunately invented the phrase, that "sraQoth words butter no parsnips," and other vulgar fellows are disposed sarcastically to apply the phrase to the words of the Superintendent Son this occasion, though not more particularly on this occasion than on other occasions on which the Superintendent hath spoken. On the second day of the session a committee was, as usual, appointed to prepare a reply to his Honor's address, and, as usual, the reply is an expression of what may; without rudeness, be characterised as amiable platitudes'. . It was a noticeable feature of the reply— if the absence of anything can be said to be a feature— that no reference was m^de to the Superintendent's grumble that the General Government had spent the West Coast vote of L 24,000, in a manner different from that which he had designed. The committee appointed to frame the reply, it is said, carefully eliminated any reference to the subject which would-create a valueless discusion, but Mr Arthur Collins, for a variety of reasons which are not deserving of description, has ; come to ,the rescue of the Superintendent, and has proposed a motion ; which, if carried in even modified form, and especially if carried with the co-operation of the so-called Executive, ought to do more towards the certainly coming cause of severance from Nelson than any other action, saving the action on the part of the Government in .connection, with the. leasing .question at Inangahua., ; (The motion referred to, and the result of the : debate 'thereon, were given in our last.) The two matters together, at any rate, are likely to be: too many for the forbearance of the people of the: West Coast. -,;*..- For the first night or two, the Order Paper was. occupied with propositions which Mr Gibbs had hatched at Collingwood during the recess, but the. process of incubation had- been defective, ■ and-the product was contemptible.; .His propositions either found ho seconder, or were, without note or comment, negatived. One of the motion's, thoiigh suggested by no nice spirit, fortunately resulted in another motion being, earned— namely, a motion for a committee of inquiry into the condition of the Nelson Lunatic Asylum—an institution which, though fairly managed, lacks many of the attributes of a well-regulated refuge and place of recovery for the insane. Another motion of his was aimed at Mr Sheppard, the Treasurer, under the cover of a desire for economy; but the veil was too transparent, and it was negatived by 12' to 4 the majority declining even, to discuss a resolution which they believed to be dictated by purely personal feelings. Another early occupant of the Order Paper was Mr Donne, who, by his' earnestness, has awoke some interest in the subj ecta of amending the Goldfields Publicans' Act and the policy off the I

Government with regard to the Inangahua leases. In connection with the first subject, he proposed that the Government ahoald bring down a measure for au amendment of the existing Act. The Government preferred to shift the responsibility on to a Select Committee. The Council preferrecT "both ""courses— a Bill by the Government, rand a Select Committee to consider it ; aridj after the thorough^ ..disposal . j?f^ the^ Highways *nd Town"lm^rovements*Als,^this is "the sub-" ject which is likelyto receive most attention, but I question much the probability of any measure of amendment being passed. No practical recommendations have come from the Wardens, though the Government was last year requested to invite their opinion, and there are divided opinions among hon. members on several points, especially that point upon which human tastes are likely to differ— the licensing of houses kept by single women. Mr Donne's question, and the Government's answer, on the subject of the lnangahua leases, you will find in the Colonist of the 3rd, ' and have probably quoted. His. motion on the subject is announced for Tuesday, and is to this effect:— "Thai; a, Select Committee be appointed to consider and report upon the policy adopted by his Honor the Superintendent in reducing the areas of certain gold mining leases, some twenty in number, applied for at the lnangahua, as shown in Gazette No; 10, dated April 24, 1872 ; and also, with respect to the refusal by the same authority of some seventeen other gold mining leases, similarly applied for and refused, as per Qazette of the same number and date ;■ such Committee to consist of the Speaker, the Provincial Secretary, Mr Luckie, Mr Reid, Mr ELynnersley, Mr Guinness, and the mover j such Committee to have power to call for persons and papers." It is a moot point how far the Qouncil is entitled to deal with the Superintendent's, exercise of the delegated powers, and they will probably be told that the subject is ultra vires. However, the matter is not likely to drop undiscussed, especially as the mover is apparently in no humor to deal with it in dilletante manner, and out of the discussion and the demonstrations on the Coast some good is likely to arise. Whatever may be the merits of the matter, it is due to Mr Donne to notice that, before any action ~was taken at lnangahua, he had introduced it to the attention of the Council. Special settlements in the-^Kj^Buller form a subject in the SuperHHwdent's address,'and a Select Committee, including three West Coast members, has been appointed to consider the proposals of the Government, but these proposals are for present in mibibus^ , the Treasurer, in moving for the Committee having only indicated their general tenor. Another Select Committee has been appointed to consider the draft agreement between the Gfenera) and Provincial Governments as to the Brunner coal-mine, but as the draft has not yet been laid on the table, I am hot in a position to inform you exactly as to its character, The Estimates are already on the table with a notice that they shall be considered on Tuesday evening, and along with them there will have to be considered the Grey Valley Road Bill, a copy of which I engloae, - The arrival of the derelict schooner Ocean Bird, has been an incident of some prominence among local events. The " righting" of her alongside the Nelson wharf was witnessed by some hundreds of spectators, who manfully stood the stench arising from her rapidly decomposing cargo. The cargo was sold to-day at a price equal to the value of the sacks in which it is contained, and the hull will, probably, be put on the cradle in a few days for re-fitting as a seaworthy craft. In consequence of a belief, or hope, th.aj tjhe. prew had escaped and vere castaway on D'Urville's Island, a whaleboat with a search party has been despatched in that direction, but there is too much reason to fear that the small boat in which they appear to have left the wreck, would scarcely survive such weather as that during which the original disaster is likely to have occurred. W"'