New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY.) FRIDAY, JANUARY 5, 1877.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 4925, 5 January 1877, Page 2

New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY.) FRIDAY, JANUARY 5, 1877.

We cannot quite understand how theHutt County Council found itself in a difficulty as to the correct reading of the Counties Act in relation to the manner in which it ! is to be brought into force, or rather the steps to be taken so as to allow it to operate in the way Parliament intended, and clearly provided it should operate. It is scarcely necessary to explain that a County Council at its first meeting may reject certain parts of the Act if it so chooses. It may elect to exercise the full powers of a governing body, or it may reject them and merely accept the responsibilities of a distributing body as set out in the 68th section. The provisions bearing on this point, 11, 12, and 13, run as follows : 11. Tha Council may, at any time within three months after its first meeting, determine by resolution that such part of this Act as is mentioned in the third schedule, shall not come into force in the county: and the chairman shall forthwith send a copy of such resolution to the Colonial Secretary. If the Council does not pass such a resalution, the whole of this Act shall be doomed to have come into force in the county. 12. If the Council determine that the said part of this Act shall not come into force in the county,— (1). None of the provisions of this Act contained in the several sections mentioned in the second schedule shall havo force in such eounty. (2). The Council shall not thereafter hold any meeting or transact any business except for the purposes in this and tho thirtieth, fifty-fourth, ' fifty-sixth, and sixty-eighth sections mentioned. (3). The Council may at any time thereafter hole 1 a special meeting for the purpose of determining, and may determine by resolution, that the whole of this Act shall come into force in the county; and tho chairman shall send a copy of such resolution to the Colonial Secretary. 13. If the Council determines by resolution passed by a clear majority in number of the whole Council at any such special meeting, as above provided, thatthe whole of this Act shall come into force within the county, then the whole of this Act shall be in force therein on and after the next day after the passing of such resolution, and Buch resolution shall not thereafter be altered or rescinded by the Council.

Now, in the face of such clearly drawn clauses as these, it is hard to conceive how the Hutt Council came to the conclusion that it was necessary to have a special meeting for the purpose of debating a resolution that the wholo of the Counties Act should be brought into operation. If the Council desired to adopt the Act it should have done so by quietly pro-

ceeding to work under it. No overt act of acceptance is at all necessary. The third section provides that the Act "shall come into operation on the day upon which the Abolition of Provinces Act, 1875, comes into operation." But by the 11th section the Council is given the option of rejecting part of the Act, and the rejection must be effected by express resolution at the first meeting. An express resolution accepting the Act as a whole is not necessary, but an express resolution rejecting part, if the Council desire to reject it, is necessary. "If the Council does not pass such a resolution," plainly reads the clause, " the whole of the Act shall be deemed to have come into force in the county." As Mr. Chew tersely put it, " the Act already wa3 in force if the Council did not meddle with it." The first proceedings must be taken under the 11th section, but the Council seems to have ignored the existence of this clause, and passed on to misapply the 12th and 13th, which only make provision for the course to be adopted after the Council has rejected part of the Act. No special meeting is necessary where such rejection has not taken place. The 12th clause says : "If the Council determine that the said part of this Act shall not come into force in the county," it may reconsider its decision subsequently if it chooses—it may "at any time thereafter hold a special meeting for the purpose of determining, and may determine by resolution, that the whole of this Act shall come into operation." This is the only case in which a special meeting is necessary, and clause 13 has reference simply and only to the preceding clause—if the course provided for in section 12, sub-section 3, has been taken the condition of things laid down in clause 13 will result. The Council being willing to accept the whole Act has nothing whatever to do with clauses 12 and 13. By their neglect to reject part of the Act the whole of the statute has been brought into operation in the county, and the best thing the Council can do is to let the special meeting drop and proceed with the work of organisation at once.