Hawke's Bay Times. THURSDAY, OCTOBER 10, 1867. TOLLGATES.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume XII, Issue 516, 10 October 1867, Page 2

Hawke's Bay Times.

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 10, 1867. TOLLGATES.

“ XiiUlns nadirhis jurnre in rrrba mtigis/ri.

The Tailgate system is an exploded method o| lamtiim : the remains of a barbarous age ; it is laisc in principle, oppressive in its operation, and extravagantly costly in its collet-lion, seldom yielding as revenue fifty per emit, of the sums abstracted from tiie public, gmirrahy very much less, ami often scarcely anything over the east of collection. If it is true that we must submit to local taxation. Ity all means let such methods he adopted as will yield to the revenue as great propoi 1 ion as possible of the money we arc called upon to pay, so that the cash paid in taxes may he devoted to its legitimate use July IS

Altiioutu abstractt-dly considered the nixing of the traffic over a road or bridge for the maintenance of such | highway appears at first sight an unobjectionable method of raising the ■ funds for such work, it becomes fan

otherwise under certain circumstances, as in a case such as that now before! the Hawke's Bay public, where a single road amongst several is proposed to ba taxed while all others are to remain free from such burthen. In fact, it can only hold the semblance of justice or tquity when it is made of universal application, and only then when the revenue so obtained is strictly devoted to the maintenance ol the particular highway or bridge on which it is raised. In a colony where population is scant and traffic limited, it is evident enough that the cost of i collecting tolls on the several roads would bo far too heavy to allow this mailed to be universally applicable, and this consideration, coupled with that of the folly of checking traffic by any such tax ns would avail for tho purposes, is sufficient to condemn the principle of toils in ali such cases. But if tbe principle itself is unsound, even in tbe event of toils being applied to their legitimate object, much

more is it so where, as in tbe case under consideration, it is proposed to devote the tolls so raised to the purposes of general revenue. If the objection to toils for road maintenance is too great to admit of the adoption of the principle, the proposal to apply them to the general revenue must merit universal condemnation. In the first place on the score of its cost of

collection ; it is abundantly evident that if, as has already been shewn, the scantiness of the population and limited traffic precludes the system of tolls being adopted as means of providing for road maintenance, on account of the great proportion of tbe sums raised being absorbed in its collection, the self-same reason would exist against the scheme as a source of revenue. Secondly—The partial introduction of the scheme, by the es« tablisiiment of a single tollgate on one particular road as a source of revenue, must be at once condemned as altogether partial and unfair.

Again, the introduction of such a system would open the door to the grossest of abuses ; let it be once conceded that tolls may be used for revenue purposes, and the ease with which such a screw could be applied, would make the Government adopt it very generally. If tolls did not pay in any particular case they would be raised and the cost of collection not increased, but the tax would operate in just the same proportion iu retarding commerce and checking industry, which rather wants fostering and encouraging. Further, as the tolls would, as all taxes must, fall not on the first payer but on the consumer, and as the poor are the great consumers of such goods as would be most largely conveyed, it would be open to all the objections of the Custom’s tariff, and, in addition to this, that it w uld be levying taxes on our own produce. Lastly—By raising tolls for revenue, the only argument by !which they could be justified is abanj'loiied ; that which is founded on the johligation of those who use a road to j effect its maintenance—because it is ■not, pretended that any part (f the itolls to be raised, should be so applied