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New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4532, 29 September 1875, Page 2

Mn. O’Neill, M.H.R., yesterday in the House of Representatives presented the following petition, signed by the Mayor of the Thames and 931 electors of the Thames Electoral District : —l. That your petitioners believe the provincial system of Government has been the means of depriving them of their rights. 2. That at the present time main trunk roads are urgently required in the district, to open up tho Tairua and Ohinemuri goldfields and to connect them with tho Thames, Tauranga, and Waikato districts. 3. That the Auckland Provincial Council at its last session failed to make any provision for the construction of such roads. 4. That your petitioners believe the proposals for abolishing the provinces now before your honorable House would afford them the relief they so urgently need. 5. That should your honorable House delay the passing of the Abolition and Local Government Bills until another session, it would be the means of inflicting serious injury and loss upon your petitioners, and would greatly retard the development of nowandrichgolddeposits,unless other provision is made for the construction of roads in the Thames district. Your petitioners therefore humbly pray that your honorable House will be pleased to pass the Abolition and Local Government Bills during the present session.

Mr. Williams has given notice to move that when the House goes into committee on the Licensing Act Amendment Bill, the following clause and schedule ho added to the Bill, viz. :—“Notwithstanding anything contained in the Licensing Act 1873 Amendment Act, 1871, no wholesale license or brewer’s license shall he issued to any person by any ProvincialTreasurerorany other person under the 10th section of the said Act, to take effect within the respective districts defined under the said Act and mentioned in the schedule hereto, or in any other district which may hereafter be defined in lieu of or in substitution for the districts mentioned in the said schedule, unless the issue of such license shall first have been approved of by the Licensing Court having jurisdiction at the place or places where it is intended such license shall take effect. The production of a certificate in writing under

the hand of the Chairman of such Licensing Court as aforesaid, to the effect that such Court approves of the issue of the license therein mentioned to the person to he named therein, shall he sufficient evidence that the Court approves of the, issue' of such license.” The schedule referred to 'in Mr. Williams’s amendment enumerates the different native districts in the North Island. The necessity for some such amendment is plain; as the law at present stands an applicant refused a license by a licensing bench within a native district has merely to go to the Provincial Treasury, pay a fee, take out a wholesale license, and so poison the Maoris wholesale. The amendment will rectify this.