The New Zealand Times (PUBLISHED DAILY.) THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1879.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 5578, 13 February 1879, Page 2

The New Zealand Times (PUBLISHED DAILY.) THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1879.

Noblesse oblige! Tho “Lyttelton Times ” comes forward to break a lance in honor of the Grahamstown Railway job ! If wo were maliciously inclined, we would reprint the very remarkable article in which our contemporary defends the indefensible, and seeks to make the worse appear tho better reason. We are bound to admit that offences of this kind are rare on the part of the “Lyttelton Times,” and wo shall, therefore, content ourselves with sot tin" our contemporary right on one or two points on which, for the, purpose of its argument, it assumes the existence of that which is not. “One of tho chief counts,” says tho “Times,” “in the indictment “ drawn by tho Opposition against Sir “ GeorgeT.Gbey appears at present to be “ that, lately at tho Thames he has “ turned tho first sod of the wrong rail- “ way. He had no business, it is said, “ to have performed that ceremonial “ operation at Grahamstown, but he “should have wheeled his barrow to “ some landing-place thirty miles up tho “ Thames, and formally there turned out “ its contents. The reason given is that “the late Ministry intended that to bo “ the terminus on the Thames side, and “ that the present Ministry is bound by “ that intention.” Wo have never heard

any such reason given, and have certainly not given any such reason or made such a statement ourselves. The late Ministry, wo believe, had not come to any determination at all about a railway to the Thames, The intention of that Ministry in regard to public works was declared to be to complete the main trunk lines throughout both Islands as rapidly as it was possible to do with the means at their disposal; having got the District Railways Act passed, they desired to leave, in the meantime at least, to districts which required branch lines, the responsibility, with the power of constructing them or getting them constructed if they choose so to do. It will be seen before very long that this was a wiser and a safer policy than that which has been and is now being pursued by the present Government.

Tapanui jobs and others of the like kind, which were swallowing up the funds available for the arterial lines, required, for decency and appearance sake, and in order to restore something like equilibrium of expenditure between the islands, —that they should have counterparts in the North. Hence came the Waikato to Thames railway. Money must be expended in the North, and it could not be immediately expended at any other point more conveniently. A railway to the Thames gave some promise of beneficial political results for the “Liberal” party. “But wo deny,” says the “Times,” “ that there is anything to show con- “ clusively that the line from the Waikato “ to the- Thames meant only a line from “Hamilton to a landing place above “Te Aroha. It is very probable that “ Mr. Macandrew in his Public Works “ Statement, when he referred to the “ line and to the existence of its survey “ plans, was not aware that the word “ ‘Thames’ did not mean the goldfields, “ but only the upper part of the river “ itself.” Mr Macandrew is a guileless gentleman in politics, as all admit; but even his opponents would not think of attributing to him such unpardonable innocence as this. Wo may assume that the Public Works Statement which he delivered was written by himself, and that he had reports and maps to guide him in preparing it, and that he studied them. Amongst his ‘ 1 proposals for the future ” he gave a place to a line “ Waikato to the Thames, “ thirty miles,” and he frankly told honorable gentlemen that of not one of the eight projects, involving a total expenditure of two and three quarter millions of money, was anything known in the way of survey results upon which he could base an estimate of the cost of construction “ except as regards the line from Waikato “to the Thames.” Under those circumstances it may be assumed, we think, that he did look at the plan, and did read Mr. Blackett’s report of Mr. Stewart’s survey of the line, and that he did not deceive the |House, as our contemporary suggests, by first saying that the proposed line was thirty miles in length, and would cost £168,000, and by then secretly taking “legislative autho- “ rity” for the making of a line sixty miles in length, which must cost £336,000. Mr, Macandrew will not be obliged to the writer of that [article’ for defending him in that way. It will be found, we think, when Parliament meets that there are gentlemen in the House of Representatives who know all the facts, and who know also that the Waikato to Thames Railway line of thirty miles runs from Hamilton to Omahu, the landing place on the river, and no further. Grahamstown happens not to bo on, or in, the Thames river at all. A considerable stream, known as the Kaueranga, used to run in front of and near to the site of the township, and gave a general name to the place. It is extremely heretical on the part of our contemporary to throw doubt upon the character of the Thames as a navigable river. He appears to have no respect for the authority of Captain Cook, to which Sir George Grey himself appeals in justification of the Grahamstown job ; but the facts remain,—the “ Lyttelton Times ” notwithstanding,—that the river is navigable, not alone for small craft, but for very large craft, and that whilst it remains so, the construction of a railway along its banks cannot be said to be a work of necessity or of urgency, or to be justifiable on any ground, regard being had to all the surrounding conditions. The “Times” quotes the provisions of the Railways Construction Act with great precision and seriousness ; but these provisions apply only to works authorised to be constructed under it, and as the Thames Valley railway is not so authorised or intended to be, there is a wilful waste of words. The work inaugurated by Sir George Grey on the mud flat at Grahamstown is a political job, pure and simple, .It commits the Colony to an expenditure of £168,000 without the authority of Parliament; but as it is impossible that the electors of any district as a body can continue to respect or confide in a Government, which in dealing with public money is regardless of that authority, the prospective benefits to the “party” may not be realised, although the money of the people may be expended and lost.