MAYORAL ROBES.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 5094, 28 February 1927, Page 2

MAYORAL ROBES.

WHAT TO WEAR ON DUKE’S VISIT. VIEWS OF SYDNEY COUNCILLORS. SYDNEY, February 17. There was some plain speaking at the meeting of the finance committee < f the City Council when the question d¥ lobes for the Lord Mayor and the town clerk for the Royal visit was discussed. The committee recommended purchasing robes for the town clerk, but laid it down that the Lord Mayor must buy his own. If he accepted the high position, it was said,' he ought to be prepared to dress for. the part. It was suggested that, Aiderman Mostyn might borrow the robes of another aiderman of similar stature. Aldeican Thompson was emphatic in opposing expenditure on robes for the Lord Mayor. “The Labour Party call each other brothers,” he said. “One brother generally lends what he has to another. Seeing Aiderman Fitzgerald has a set off robes he might hand them over to Aiderman Mostyn. They are about the same size, and the same robes would fit both.” AS OTHERS SEE US. “We want to see each other as others see us,” Alderman Thompson continued. He told the meeting that on one occasion he had not taken part in a procession, but had watched th? other aldermen in it. “There was the Lord Mayor, got up like a king parrot„ with all the colours imaginable. The Lord Mayor’s orderly had as much gold braid as an admiral. The town clerk had his wig and gown. Then ’followed the aidermen—a rare lot of Beau Brummels, a rag-tag and bob-tail crowd.. “If,” added Alderman Thompson, “you decorate the Lord Mayor, the town clerk, and the Lord Mayor’s orderly, and the other aidermen follow in all kinds of hats and all in different suits of clothes, you wlil be the laughing-stock of everybody.” He painted out that, the council had a uniform, but its observance had been honoured in the breach. It was a beautiful sight to see the Lord Mayor, his orderly, and the clerk, but a beastly sight to see the others following iii all sorts of hats and coats. If they were to have a uniform let it .be as simple as possible. Those who sought high office should be able to dress the part. They should not rely upon the ratepayers to do it.

Lard Mayors of the past, whether Labour or otherwise, had purchased their own robes, Alderman Courtenay pointed out, and had not been ashamed t > wear them. If, the Lord Mayor ot Sydney wished te dress for. the part let him purchase his robes, the same as previous Lord Mayors had done. The town clerk was a paid official of the council, and if he had to dress according to regulation he thought the couiicil was entitled .to pay for his robes. If the Lord Mayor was not big enough tjo buy his robes and put up with what little criticism there might be from certain people, Alderman Courtenay said, “let him go without.” He recalled a proposal that had been made to add dignity to the sanitary inspectors by putting them in frock coats and tall hats, but the visualisation of 60 ar them in that garb killed the proposal with ridicule. The finance committee recommended that robes be purchased tor the town clerk, but that the Lord Mayor must purchase his own.