IMPORTANT DESPATCH FROM HOME.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume II, Issue 59, 14 August 1862, Page 1 (Supplement)

IMPORTANT DESPATCH FROM HOME.

(From the New Zealand Advertiser , Aug. 7.) The Native Minister last night laid on the table, by command of His Excellency, the following despatch from the Duke of Newcastle received on Tuesday by the Wonga Wong a, from Auckland. At the desire of the House, Mr. Bell read the despatch, which was ordered to be printed forthwith; Downing-st reef, 26th May, 1562. Sm, —I hare had under my consideration your despatches, noted in the margin, informing me of the language which you have held to your Ministry, of the plans which you propose" to yourself and them, and of the course which you desire the Home Government to pursue in regard to the management of Native affairs, and the cost of the war in New Zealand. 1. In the first place, you inform mo that you propose hereafter to conduct Native affairs, like all other matters, with the advice of your Executive Council, and you deprecate any attempt to set up either the Governor, or any special bodv, between the natives and the General Asscmbh as a protective power. 2. You propose to establish a machinery for the government and improvement of the natives, which you suppose will eventually cost about fiftv thousand pounds a-year. Half of this sum you state is already provided by the Colonial Legislature, and you have led the local Government to expect that the other half will be virtually supplied by the Imperial Government in the shape of a reduction from the Colonial contribution of five pounds a head to the expense of the Imperial force stationed in New Zealand. 3. You propose the maintenance for some years of a large military force, partly as a standing exhibition of strength and determination, partly in order to afford to the out-settlers that protection and sense of security which is essential to enable them profitably to occupy their farms. 4. You suggest that roads should be made by the troops (still supported, I presume, at the expense of the Imperial Treasury), in conjunction with Natives, and 5. You propose that military men should be employed as Commissioners in the Native districts continuing while so employed to receive Imperial pay and allowances. With regard to the increasing debt due from the Colony to the British Treasury, you state that to exact payment would be to ruin the Colony, and you transmit a memorandum drawn up by the Colonial Treasurer, proposing the following course, “ not to attempt to meet these demands, or to provide for this excessive expenditure at present, but to wait till the existing difficulty is removed, to ascertain with accuracy what proportion of the expenses the Imperial Government would, after due deliberation and a full knowledge of the facts- of the case, charge the Colony with, and then to apply for a guaranteed loan of the requisite amount.” Now I must in the first place observe, that I see in the papers before me no adequate apprehension on the part of the New Zealand Government, of the obligation under which the colonists ‘ hcmselvcs lie to exert themselves in their own defence, and to submit to those sacrifices which are necessary from persons whose lives and property arc in danger. Mr. Reader Wood states that the annual revenue of the colony (independently of the land revenue) is two hundred and seventy-two thousand pounds ; he mentions that ninety thousand pounds of that sum arc paid to Provincial Governments and iu> observes that the land fund is |v v 'vincial revenue, and expended in colonization and public works ; but it does not appear to occur to him that the revenue itself might be increased by the imposition of fresh taxation—(hat the portion of that revenue which is so applied as to relieve municipalities from the necessity of imposing local taxes might be applied in whole, or in part, to the more pressing needs of the Colony, and that the portion of that revenue which is devoted to public works and colonization may, in times of disaster, and particularly in time of civil war, which is disaster, be diverted t > the per oa - ent object of averting absolute ruin. No doubt in steps like these, the colony would bo making sacrifices. But this is exactly what the British Government has a right to expect from them. Those who are expending half-a-milliou

a year in defence of the colonists and their property (a very appreciable item among those which fix on the British tax-payer the burthen of an income-tax) are entitled to expect from these colonists that, instead of having recourse to the momentary relief of a loan, exhausted it would seem almost before it was raised, they should by some immediate, general, and las! ing sacrifice of the kind which I have indicated, give some pledge of their readiness to take their share, as far as (heir means will allow, in the defence of <heir country, and in connexion with this subject I cannot pass without remark that passage in the Colonial Treasurer’s financial statement of 23rd .Tidy, ISGI, in which he characterizes as “ most unfairly charged against the Colony” demands properly made against the Colonial Government by the Commissariat, nor the very strong animadversions made in the Colonial Legislature on the conduct of the Commissariat Officer in bringing forward these claims in the simple discharge of his duty. Little, however, as I am satisfied with the contents of your despatch, in these respects, I am earnestly desirous to afford the Colony in a lime of undoubted trial, the utmost assistance which can be given with any justice to this country. I therefore proceed to communicate to you as explicitly as is now possible, the decision of her Majesty’s Government upon the questions you have raised. I am ready to sanction the important step ' you have already taken in placing the management of the natives under the control of the Assembly. I do so partly in reliance on your own capacity to perceive, and your desire to do what is best for those m whose welfare I knowyouaro so much interested. But I do it also because I cannot disguise from myself that the endeavor to keep the management of the natives under the control of the Home Government has failed. It can only be mischievous to retain a shadow of responsibly when the beneficial exercise of power has become impossible. I cannot hold out to you any hopes that a largo military force will for any length of time be kept in New Zealand. It is for the colonists themselves to provide such a military police force as will protect their out-setilers. If it is not worth while to the Colony to furnish such protection, it would seem to follow that it is not worth while to retain these out-settlomcnis. You must therefore expect, though not an immediate, yet a speedy and considerable diminution of the force now employed. I doubt whether, under present military regulations, an officer can be detached from his regiment to serve as Commission er in a native district, but in case this should prove practicable her Majesty’s Government can only assent to such an arrangement on the understanding that the whole pay outlie officer shall be defrayed by the Colony. / I can holdout no project that {l.l, coumry will consent fu, bear any part of the* expense of the local militia and volunteers ; all existing and future liabilities on this score must be defrayed by the Colony. This sum appears to have amounted, on the 20th of October last, to one hundred and ninety-three thousand one hundred and eighty pounds. The agreement so lately ''entered into by the Colonial Government for the contribution of “five pounds per man to the cost of the troops stationed m the Colony, must also be fulfilled up to the close of the year 1801. But in consideration of the present difficulties of the Colony and in compliance with your advice, her Majesty’s Government will be "prepared under the following conditions, to reckon as military contribution all sums shown to bo expended in a manner approved by you on native government, or other purely native objects, in excess of twenty-six thousand pounds, which I understand to be the amount now paid from the Colonial revenue towards those objects. The conditions subject to which T am able to authorise this concession are the following : 1. The amount furnished by the Colonial Government shall not be less than Twenty-six (thousand pounds, and that furnished by the Imperial Government must not exceed the amount of Military contribution due from the Colonial to the Imperial Government, calculated at the rate of Five pounds a head for every soldier employed. 2. No other Imperial funds are to be employed nor any advances procured from the Treasury Chest towards paying the expenses of the scheme. 3. An account of these expenses must be furnished to the Controller of the Treasury Chest for the information of Her Majesty’s Government and of Parliament shewing the amount and application of this Imperial contribution. •I. The present arrangement is to last for three years, that is to say, from the Ist January, 1802, to the 31st December, 1801, when it is to bo hoped that the Colony may be in a position to provide for the well-being and government of the natives, so far as the institutions which you propose to introduce shall not have become selfsupportina by means of local taxation, a result which you will keep steadily in view, and the importance of which I cannot too earnestly impress upon you. in giving vp a for limited porod the claim of tin’s country to a portion of the present military conh Tuition, no pledge is to bo implied as to the continuance of that contribution as a parmaneut r.irangcncnt; but it is clearly io be understood, that the aid tu be required from New Zealand for military protection shall remain subject to any gen j’:il measure which Parliament, or Her Majesty’s Government, may adopt wiili regard to the maintenance of Imperial troops in (lie Colonies. You will not fail, I (nisi, to recognise, in those concessions, the desire of Her Majesty’s Government to co-operate, in a spirli of liberality and confidence, with yourself and Hie Colony, in (ho important and hopeful attempt which you and your Ministers are now making to introduce such civilizing institutions among flic native tribes as may, under the ’lc si >g of Providence, save both races of I Ter Majesty’s subjects in New Zealand from the miseries of civil war, and (he Imperial and the Colonial Governments from the heavy burdens which it entails. 1 have, &c., (Signed) Newcastle.