RATES ON STATE-OWNED DWELLINGS.

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 20, 16 October 1937, Page 4

RATES ON STATE-OWNED DWELLINGS.

Tbe communication from tfija Minister of Finance regarding tlie payment of rates on. State-owned dwellings wliich the Mayor was able to lay before the Hastings Borough Council last Thn.rsday makes good reading as intimating a step in the right direction by the Government. The Minister states explicitly that the Government will hold itself responsihle for the payment in full of rates on these residences so long as thy are in occupation. This may not go all the way to doing full-justice to municipalities, for that would mean the Government accepting the same responsibility for the payment of rates as is imposed on private dVners, who, we take it, have to pay whether their properties are tenanted or not. It is, however, so far as it goes, a definite if only slight surrender of the Grown privilege beliind whieh, in like and other connections, governments have hitherto taken nnjustifiable shelter. In relation to this question of rates it has. of course, been rural local bodieSj and especially those in the backblocks least able to etand it, who hav.e suft'ered most from the Government, whcfchei? as landlord or mortgagee, refusing to assume the liability for payment of rates to which all other ownqrs and mortgagees are subject. The gross injnstice of this is pbvious when we come to realise the widesperad extent to which> the Government occupies one or other of these positions. Mr Nash may not have ventured very far out from the protection afforded by what, under such canditions, should really be the obsolete doctrine of Crown privilege. But he has at least had the courage to forgo that adyantage in an appreciable way, and, as the French say» it is the first step that counts. It is scarcely to be expected that. having made this movement, the Government will go the whole length of remedying in a general way an injustice that is of so long standing, for that would iuvolve the assumption of a vast responsibility for which no provision has been made. It is, however, something to have the principle of the State' s liability admitted even to this limited extent, and due credit must. be given to the Minister who has been the first to acknowledge it..