THE MARLBOROUGH CUSTOMS DEBATE.

Marlborough Express, Volume IV, Issue 197, 2 October 1869, Page 4

THE MARLBOROUGH CUSTOMS DEBATE.

(Continued from our last.) Mr. Travers thought a few words might be said with regard to what fell from the honorable member for Cheviot, The land fund, no doubt, was a special fund, and should be appropriated to certain specific objects, and there could be no barm whatsoever in transferring to local bodies, such as county boards, the expenditure of that proportion of the fund which could clearly be applied to local works, whilst the residue should be appropriated by the General Legislature in carrying out those larger purposes for which the land fund was originally intended. It appeared to him the land fund should be administered primarily by the General Legislature of the Colony, and the time was coming when that course would have to be adopted, and only a reasonable portion handed over to local bodies for local purposes. In regard to the customs revenue, the vice of the thing was this : that a larger amount of revenue was raised by way of customs than was essential for the necessary purposes of government in

the country. The customs x’evenue should be limited to the necessities of government; and if the General Government chose to delegate to Provincial Governments the administration of certain departments, it might transfer to those Provincial Governments that proportion of customs revenue which was necessary for the maintenance of those particular departments of government. But no revenue should be raised by means of customs, more than was actually essential to the good government of the country, assuming its legislation to be confined to one Legislature, though its administration might be divided between the general and a variety of local administrative bodies. The mischief was that they were raising money for certain purposes, and permitting it to be spent without any responsibility of any kind. The people of the Colony knew that a large proportion of the customs revenue passed over to Provincial Governments, and if they demanded an account of it, the General Government would be unable to give it. The General Government of the Colony had the responsibility for the extravagance of the Colony, without having any control whatsoever over the expenditure which produced that extravagance. As to the form of government, there could be no difficulty whatsoever; and it appeared to him that the present Timaru District presented a xriodel in that respect. The only reason why Timaru had any ground of complaint, was that it did not handle any proportion of those funds which were placed at the disposal of the Provincial Government of Canterbury for purposes in which it had as large an interest as any other portion of the Province, namely the customs revenue. Take away every farthing of the customs revenue from the Provinces, beyond that which was necessary for the administration of purposes of General Government, and let them tax thems Ives to meet their own necessities for other purposes. The sooner people came to understand that, for all municipal purposes, they must put their hands directly into their pockets, if they would keep themselves on an equality with the more advanced portions of the Colony, the better. Until the General Government ceased to raise revenue to be expended by authorities not responsible to that Government, there would never be developed that statesmanship which was essential to a Colony like Hew Zealand. As regarded climate, resources, and evervthins calculated to make a country great and prosperous, New Zealand was unsurpassed in the southern seas; and all that was needed to make it advance in a way satisfactory to everybody, was a sound and proper system of government. The first table in the statistics for 1868 showed a lamentable state of things—that during that year, the excess of immigrants over emigrants was only 860, against an excess of 4,850 in 1867, the average for some previous years having been an excess of 9,250 persons yearly. Why was that so ? Clearly, because of the utter and miserable neglect of the functions devolved upon Provincial Governments, who, instead of spending their money so as to induce immigration and to retain those people who had already arrived, devoted it to local purposes of comparatively less necessity, under the pressure, in ninety-nine cases out of every hundred, of abominable jobbery. Mr. Creighton attributed the falling off in immigration entirely to the lamentable news sent home from this country, and the mismanagement of the war; not to any failure on the part of Provincial authorities in the discharge of functions confided to them.

Mr. Eyes, in reply, said that the excess of males in Marlborough was established by the petition which he presented two years ago. That petition showed that, according to the census returns, the centesimal excess of males over females in Marlborough was 24-6, whereas for the whole Colony the centesimal excess was 23'82.

The question, that the Chairman do now leave the chair, was put and agreed to.