EDUCATION RATE.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4486, 5 August 1875, Page 2

EDUCATION RATE.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE NEW ZEALAND TIMES, Sui f —l am an old settler, having arrived in Wellington in 1841, and therefore know most of the other old settlers, and am not a little surprised that many whom I deem more competent than myself, have not remonstrated against the imposition of the above tax, I have therefore taken up the cudgels myself. I presume the Highways and Education Act was passed in the Provincial Council, for three years a valuation rate of a penny in the pound for the highway and half that sum for education. I will not touch on the highway rate, although unjust enough, but a more iniquitous or premature tax never was passed in a civilised country than the Education Act. We are paying the tax twice over. Thus: Who are the people to be benefited by it ?—I suppose the artisans, laborers, &c. Now the artisans are earning (and have been for some time) from ten to fourteen shillings per diem, the laborers from seven to ten shillings, the people who are paying these first-rate wages being taxed to educate the children of the said artisans. It is monstrous !

We in the country who could not send our children to the schools even if we would, have to pay the heaviest. We pay to have our children educated in the best schools, and when we have done that, in our old age we are called upon to educate the children of others who are earning first class wage?. Sir. under these circumstances I am delighted to see that we shall soon hear the last of provincial institutions.

Now, about the framers of this iniquitous Act. Are they not Sherbet and Gunny, the latter being the prime mover ? I say they are. But would Messrs. Sherbet and Gunny have voted for such an Act had they not been receiving a good many carpenters’ wages each. On looking at their political lives it would appear as if they had taken leaves out of the book of the Yorkshire schoolmaster of Dotheboys Hall, so well described by Dickens, but ignoring those classical but deathless words, Fiat justitia mat cwlum. None would have protested more vehemently against this iniquitous tax than these two individuals. Sherbet would have raised that solemn phiz of his, and waived his hand and used all the persuasive oily gammon so characteristic of that individual : and Gunny would have raised his voice and called up the brass he is possessed of (and .that is not a little), and declaimed against it, as the most unheard-of impression. Sir, of course you are aware that the first term of the Act has expired, and a new assessment has been made. Now, would you believe it that this assessment in these prosperous times has been raised from 35 to, in some cases, 70 per cent, higher than the previous assessment. And why?—Because we have paid the aforesaid high wages, and have improved our properties, and for these improvements must pay the penalty of our industry. Can there be a greater blow to progress than this ? A few more words, and I have done. It is argued that education prevents crime : but that is doubtful. I believe that there are a great many educated men whose crimes entail more misery than ten times the number of uneducated. —lam, &c., An Old Settler. August 2.