A TRIPLING DISCREPANCY.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 25, 29 January 1873, Page 2

A TRIPLING DISCREPANCY.

To the Editor of the Nelson Evening Mail. Sie —l am delighted to find that a vigilant watch is kept over Provincial affairs by at least one of the newspapers in the town. Within the last month or two the Colonist has discovered that the Superintendent was guilty of a serious error bf omission in not purchasing the plant of the Dun Mountain railway, which, by the way, was sold by auction during the time the Council was in session, when not a word was said about the matter by any of the members. Your contemporary, after expressing an opinion that an unauthorised expenditure of the public money in this direction would have been perfectly justifia- . ble, goes on to say : —"But when we find that the Council in its last session actually voted £5000 to make a. tramway from the Brunner mine to Cobden, the: excuse that there was no money vote available for such a purpose (that is the purchase of the Dun Mountain railway plant) falls to,the ground." This might have formed a very fair ground for complaint against the Superintendent with those who tbink it is his duty to speculate in old iron, but unfortunately there is one little circumstance that haß been overlooked by the Colonist, but which militates seriously against it's argument. It is this. The Dun Mountain property, had been disposed cf very nearly a month before the money was voted. Mr Levien became the purchaser on the.lsth of May, and it was not until the 12th of June that the Council agreed to devote a sum of £5000 to the

v erection of a tramway. The whole of the article in to-day's Colonist is based upon the assumption that; at the time the property alluded to was offered for sale, tie Superintendent had received the sanction of the Council to draw upon the' Treasury for £5000 for the construction of a ' certain tramway. I think that the least it can do, now that the mistake has been pointed out, is to" acknowlege its error, and endeavor for the future to be less blindly defiant of facts. I am •no bigoted admirer of the Superintendent, but when I see silly attacks of this description made upon him, I am led to believe that his opponents must., either have a very weak case, or be totally lost to all sense of honesty and fairness in carrying out their political warfare. I am, &c, ■ Fight Faie. Nelson, January 28-