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Hokitika Guardian, 16 February 1923, Page 2

Thk local bodies arc persistent in their demands for recognition of their claims in respect to lost revenues from timber royalties. A large amount lias gone already, additional amounts are to go, and in tile end all the revenue will disapponj- ns a local source ol income. The Forestry Department is swallowing it up, and lias capacity enough to take the lot. s ( > Hie alisovb--1 ion will he complete in the end, not a very remote period either. The public as a whole are taking this legal appropriation very tamely. The local bodies are fighting a lona hand, yet the matter is one directly affecting ti c ratepayer section of the public; and incidentally the public at large, ft is the public asset which is being consumed departinentally. and money which should be available for 10. al purposes is going Into a common fund in Wellington, and being expended all over the Dominion. There is a' vast extent of busli in Westland, yet the wealth from that domestic asset will not be ear-marked for the district, but a lavish Department will go on sustaining itself all over the Dominion, and the public highways in Westland which will have to carry a substantial portion of the traffic occasioning the wealth, and will be a charge on the retiring people of Westland who are taking all this injustice sitting down The matter is not a new one in the local press. Wc have urged attention over and over again, and earned no small amount of official antipathy in consequence. Bat that we will try to bear cheerfully. ,As the matter came before the Westland County Council on Tuesday, ft was plain that a monstrous injustice was being done to the district. The legitimate revenue of the district is being filched from the local body and seems to be used for the time being in pampering a very expensive Department with large ideals and costly methods of procedure. Its aims are of the highest and it is preparing a plan of campaign which is simply magnificent, but if the ratepayers who are being imposed upon for this high purpose will only wake up, they will realise that wliat is being done is not reafforestation but rather the execution of a very extravagant hobby which is far too costly to be dealt with while the country as a whole is so overtaxed, and the settlers in all parts crying out for roads, which the Government argue they have not the means to provide.

While the neglect of the backblock roads is so palpable, and the Government are turning down all applications for road grants, they are at the moment appropriating to their own special funds the timber royalties from Westland And tliey arc going one

better, for in about six weeks’ time j they arc handing over to the Westland County Council from which they will be taking over twenty per cent of its revenue, a length of main road which requires some £6,000 spent on it for safety sake, and probably £1,500 a year for maintenance I This sort of unpaternal treatment Should open the eyes to the confiding public to what the real loss of the revenue will be, and as if that is not sufficient wrong, in addition, a greater liability is to be thrown on tho ratepayers to maintain Government roads. Yet the same Government goes along cheerfully encouraging a newly foisted Department to launch out in all directions in the matter of spending money for the benefit of posterity, while from the people of the present are to be taken the money to build up the future fortunes of those who are to come after. In this forced levy only a section, a very small section of the people will be penalised. Here, where the people live lived in hopes for years, putting; it]) with the isolation and drawbacks of a remote situation, expecting the district to reap the benefit of the return when communication bettered itself, the advantage from the local source of revenue is to lie taken front the immediate district to which it belonged, and is to be spread broadcast, localities already well settled getting as liberal a share of the expenditure as locally. While this is being perpetrated fresh burdens are being put upon the people, who are ignored at every turn. Government and Ministers make promises, and professions, they are ignored. Parliament passes remedial legislation, the Government cause It to remain inoperative. The local bodies seek redress, the Prime Minister dallies over receiving the deputation. Injustice upon injustice attends the appeals, and this from a Government the slogan of which is “it square deal for .ill." Fudge!