The Oamaru Mail. TUESDAY, JUNE 15, 1880.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1307, 15 June 1880, Page 2

The Oamaru Mail. TUESDAY, JUNE 15, 1880.

The more carefully we consider the Colonial Treasurer's scheme for supplanting the subsidies to local governing bodies, the more firmly do we become convinced that it is clumsy, intricate, unjust, and to Canterbury and Otago eminently unsatisfactory. The constitution of the proposed Board to dispense "charitable aid" to local governing bodies is another objectionable feature in the - scheme. While all our efforts should be made in the direction of decentralising as much as possible the administration of matters of local importance, we have in the scheme before us a proposal tending in the opposite direction, and that, too, in a most objectionable form—administration from the seat of Government by the Minister for Public Works and three Government officials. It would be impossible to conceive any suggestion more antagonistic to the first principles of local selfgovernment than the proposal submitted by the Colonial Treasurer as the means of putting " our local bodies in such a position as will enable them to do the work which rightly devolves upon them, and which must be done by them if the country is to be prosperously settled." Under the Government proposal local self-government will exist . only in the name ; the power of the local bodies will be reduced to merely taxing and borrowing and then taxing again to pay interest, while the greater portion of the power of government will be centred in an irresponsible Board sitting in Wellington. Very great powers are to be given to that Board—powers that should certainly be placed in the hands of representatives directly responsible to the people, and not to a Board consisting of the Minister of Public Works and a few Government servants, whose privilege will be to sit at the same table with a member of the Ministry and say yes when he says yes, or no when he says no. We do not for one moment wish to insinuate that Mr. Oliver would use hi 3 influence over his subordinates. He is too high-minded and public-spirited to dream of doing anything derogatory to the high position in which he has been placed. True, it was a mistake to erect cattle yards on his Curriedale estate at the public expense, and refuse to grant a similar boon to the farmers of the Ngapara district. But objectionable as the constitution of the Board of Works unquestionably is, the mode of providing "an equivalent" for the subsidies is still more objectionable. First, then, we find that not only are the subsidies to be withdrawn from local bodies, but the Counties are also to be called upon to forego the 20 per cent, of the land fund allocated to them by the Financial Arrangements Act, and in return they are to have the right of taxing the native and Crown lands within their borders. To some portions of the Colony this may appear a reasonable arrangement, but to Canterbury and Otago it is not only unreasonable, but manifestly unjust. This, we think, can be made very clear. In the first place, then, we find that there is very little Crown or native lands within this provincial district from which the Counties can derive revenue. The greater bulk of the Crown lands open to taxation in Canterbury and Otago consists of high mountain ranges, which cannot be assessed at any value, nearly the whole of the workable land, the occupiers of which already pay taxes, being let. Of native lands, then, there are only small areas, and many of these are also in the hands of tenants, who pay rates, now, if we turn to the North Island we find that there are millions of acres of Maori lands upon which the proposed new rates will have to be paid, but it must be borne in mind that the native owners will not be called upon to pay these rates. With that paternal care for the native race which characterises the Ministry, it is proposed that the Colony shall pay the rates upon native lands. As the money to do so will be derived from the land fund, and as the bulk of the land fund is obtained from Canterbury and Otago, it must be clear to the dullest comprehension that a gross injustice is sought to be inflicted upon this and the sister Provincial District. In other words the Counties of Otago and Canterbury are to be deprived of the 20 per cent allowed them by law, of the land fund raised within their boundaries in order that the Government may have money wherewith to pay the tax upon the native lands in the North; or, in other words, the Counties of Otago and Canterbury are to be robbed in order that the Counties of Auckland, Hawkes' Bay, Wellington, and Taranaki maybeenriched. The proposal inrelationto boroughs is even more unsatisfactory. In return for the withdrawal of the subsidies they are simply to receive the power of levying taxes upon Native and Crown lands, the latter with a number of exceptions. To many boroughs this will also prove exceedingly unjust. Many of these boroughs have undertaken extensive public works in the full belief that the subsidies would be continued. They have borrowed extensively, and the subsidies have in the majority of cases been put forth as a portion of the secutity offered to the English money lender. Without these subsidies they will be deprived of the power of paying interest on their loans, and they will be forced to resort to additional taxation, for it must be borne in mind that many of the boroughs of the Colony will have but trifling amounts of Crown and Native lands to tax. Take the case of Oamaru, for example. The withdrawal of the subsidies means a loss of L2OOO a year ; and yet what Crown or Native lands have we to fall back upon as a means of raising money to make up this loss ? Very little indeed. We have no elegant and valuable public buildings to levy rates upon, and the sum obtainable to supply the place of the subsidies will be but as a drop in the ocean. ,To what does this fact point, if the Government proposals are carried out? We will tell those who have not made the calculation for themselves. It points unmistakcably,

to the striking of an additional rate of a shilling in the £. Of this there can be no question, for we must have sufficient: money to meet our engagements, and there are no means by which the money can be obtained, if, us we suppose will be the case, the Government measures be carried into effectin their present shape. Truly, " the local governing bodies will spend their own money, and not the money of other people."