PATEA COUNTY MAIL PUBLISHED Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 1880. RAILWAY MYSTERIES.

Patea Mail, 18 November 1880, Page 2

PATEA COUNTY MAIL PUBLISHED Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 1880. RAILWAY MYSTERIES.

After much consideration, tho Government have discovered that what is most urgently required to complete the unfinished West Coast Railway is a stationmaster’s house at Hawera. The line is just opened to Ngaire, and may be completed to Normanby in eight or nine months. No contract is yet called for the work between that town and Hawera, but lot us hope the iron horse will reach Hawera within twelve months. No station-master’s house is being built at Normanby. Plow is that ? When Normanby traffic commences, is the Normanby station-master to live at Hawera? The site for the Normanby station is not yet fixed. Persons interested in it are unable to get any information as to when it will be fixed. But the Government, in its wisdom, has decided that Hawera is in want of a station-master’s house,and is to have it before any such house is built at Normanby. That is railway policy with a vengeance ! In the meantime, Hawera is to have a station-master’s house. What Hawera will do with this new toy during the twelve months before the station-master comes, is one of those problems which no one outside of Hawera can understand. We would rather see tenders called for another length of railway to connect Hawera, than see the people tickled with this practical joke about a house without a tenant.

The calling of lenders for this bouse is one of those official actions the meaning of which remains to be disclosed by future events. It is like making a piece of railway and a harbor wharf at Patea, but making no connection either north or south. Why should there bo any mystery about railway policy ? Wc can only look on these things as sops thrown to the hungry supporters of sonic Minister who feels it necessary to “make a show.” The Minister would do himself more justice, and would command a larger and worthier support, by carrying forward a clear policy conceived in tho interest of the colony as a whole, and worked out with straightforward simplicity. This pandering to the claims of small selfish sections of supporters,whether in Patea, in Hawera, in Now Plymouth, or in Wanganui, is a sacrifice of principle which betrays culpable insincerity. It would bo as sensible to call for tenders to build a station-master’s bouse at Patea harbor long before it could be wanted, as it is to build one at Hawera long before any station can bo used at Hawera. A station-master is not wanted until the lino is actually ready for working. Then why is this bouse to bo built so long before it can be tenanted ? VVc think the Hawera people are being trifled with. They ask for the railway to be carried to their doors, and Ministers reply by promising them a stationmaster’s house. Mind, they don’t promise to put a station-master in the house. He would be useless at Hawera until the railway is open to HaweraBut if Hawera will keep quiet, a stationmaster’s house shall be built before the railway is commenced, so that people may look at the empty house and thank goodnes for being so favored.