SEWERAGE TENDERS.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVII, Issue 4926, 15 January 1926, Page 2

SEWERAGE TENDERS.

METHODS CRITICISED. DISCUSSION BY COUNCIL. At the meeting, of .the Paeroa, Borough Council last evening a letter was read f rom Mr W. Forrest, Paeroa. as follows :— “I'respectfully heg to bring before your notice the matter of the borough’s system of getting designs and tenders for private sewerage connections. The practice is to instruct Mr Francis Battson :to prepare a plan and specification and call public tenders. Mr Battson himself tenders, which is a, thing unprecedented. No person, anywhere,'. who prepares plans and specifications, is a competitor when public tenders are called. Further, if he gete the tender he no remuneration for his plans ; if he does not get the contract, then he is paid by the borough a commission on a fixed scale. This gentleman is not a resident of .the borough, or even of the district, and why he receives, such preferential treatment is. hard to explain or even surmise. I beg to request that the practice be altered and everyone be given a fair opportunity!”

It was moved by the Mayor “That Mr Forrest be informed that the council is of the opinion that the present arrangements are working out to the very definite advantage of the principal persons concerned, namely, the ratepayers requiring financial assistance. Further, that the council fails to see anything improper in the arrangement, or of advantage to Battson, .and that the arrangement will stand.”

Seconded by Cr. Pinder. The Mayor said that the council was not out to study the tenderers. The Government auditor had personally told him that there was not a borough in New Ze’aland that was not losing money on sewerage connections- Those who were receiving financial assistance were receiving the best possible value for the outlay. EYcrytiling was fair and above board. No tenders were let until the plans had been approved of by the Health Inspector. There was no advantage given to any one tenderer over another. If anyone could suggest an arrangement that would be an equitable one without an increasted cost to the borough or the consumer it would lie welcomed. The resolution was carried!