PUBLIC OPINION.

Patea Mail, 16 September 1881, Page 3

PUBLIC OPINION.

Contributions, Letters, Inquiries and Answers thereto, are invited on Farming. Commerce, Politics, and matters of interest to the Patea district. Names of writers need not be printed. • THAT TELEGRAM. . I wish to make a personal explanation. It was with reluctance I intervened to stop a useless resolution at the meeting of ratepayers on Tuesday. I had been asked by Mr Dale to sign a requisition about 2-45 o’clock on Monday afternoon. J told him the meeting would be too late, as. I had information that the House would rise certainly within a fortnight, and the Harbor Bill could not be got through in the time. ( A few minutes later I learnt,by wire that the Premier had announced prorogation for next week.) However, Mr Dale said he was sure there would be time, and that he proposed to have the public meeting called for next evening. I expressed surprise at the shortness of the notice ; but I said the meeting would promote discussion of the question, and could do no harm. There/’ore I signed the requisition. It is now said I was a convener of the meeting, and that as such I ought to have handed to other, conveners a certain telegram 1 received just before the meeting. Now if I am called a convener, it should be in a qualified sense. I had advocated a public meeting being called in the borough before the Harbor Board met to reconsider the first hasty decision of some members for withdrawing the bill. I followed up that advocacy by calling on Mr Dale, on Mr Tennent, and on other influential ratepayers, urging that a public meeting be got up to test the willingness of borough residents to be rated for starting- the harbor works, and thereby imparting a hew impulse to the’ growth of the town and district. This was the course I took at an early date, but did other persons move then ? Not a bit. Next, the Harbor Board confirmed the previous decision to have the bill withdrawn. After that decision I ceased to regard the bill as of any use, because it seems to me an absurd position to urge Major Atkinson to push through a harbor bill against the express instruction of the proper local authority—namely the Harbor Board. The whole question should have been referred to the public earlier. I do not mind confessing surprise and disappointment at the little public spirit which local leaders showed in the earlier stage of this important question of resuming the harbor works. I am convinced that if prompt steps had been taken to convene a town meeting, the Harbor Board would not have come to an adverse decision when they knew a meeting was pending, but would have waited for that meeting ‘ to instruct the Harbor Board as to withdrawing the " bill ’ or not. Moving too late is worse than not moving at all. ; It should be observed that I interposed at the meeting only to explain what; other responsible persons had failed to explain. The information I had was obtained, not for the meeting, but to guide me in expressing through the Mail an opinion on the new situation which had been created by calling a public meeting at the last moment. That information reached me in a conclusive form just before the meeting, though X had conjectured it before, and had been seeking confirmation of that conjecture. Of course I expected that other persons at the meeting would raise the same point as being fatal to the business in hand, for if "fs reasonable to suppose that a Standing Order of the House should be I known to persons who are recognised in

this district as authorities on forms and precedents, and on Parliamentary rules. It wonld have been presumption for mo, a new colonist, to suppose that I was the only person in Patea who knew a Standing Order of the House of Representatives.

Finally, I did hope it would not be necessary for me to say a word at the meeting. It ought to be known that I rigidly abstain from speaking at public meetings, except to give explanation oh some point arising in the business. I think a journalist can be most useful by keeping to his proper sphere. When it did become necessary to rise and explain, I considered that my position required me to make the explanation to the meeting as a whole, and not confine it to one or two conveners. If in doing that I seemed to be lacking in courtesy to those who are styled my fellowconveners, I regret the result, and apologise for any unintentional want of consideration. What X did was done on the spur of the moment; was done without the knowledge of anyone ; and was done with a feeling of surprise that it should fall to me to inform the promoters of a fact which it was clearly their duty to have ascertained before convening the meeting. It should be recognised that the omission lies with those who took the public by surprise with a sudden whirlwind notice. Edward Houghton. -- ' —>*■ WOODVILLE SCHOOL. As Mr Contts practically admits the justice of my complaints, I have not much more to say. I did omit mention of his subscription, but I was simply reviewing his action as a member of. the Education Board in connection with this school, not his deeds as a private citizen ; his snbsciption was, I believe, gratefully acknowledged by the gentleman who received it. Mr Contts’s little inuendo about a pending election is very neatly put; but is he not entering upon rather a dedicate subject ? The Government cannot nominate a defeated [Candidate to the Education Board, yon know. Mr Coutts is asked to give his authority for the demand of of land, and cannot do it. Although lam much in favorof that area if the Board will acquire it, I must object to being referred to Mr Gane (for whose out-spokenness I have considerable admiration), that gentleman having also a grievance against Mr Coutts.

Mr Molecule is curious as to what the Committee want from the Board. The Committee sent down a modest request for ceiling and lining ; for a porch in which to hang up wet caps and cloaks, and for a coat of paint, amounting to (speaking from memory) about £3O. The reply was a refusal. The Com mittee protested against the injustice, and it was then that the gentleman to whom we most looked for advocacy informed the Board that we had received ‘ ample justice.’ Why, it is only now that a W C is being erected—not by the Board, but by the settlers ! I would respectfully submit for Mr Contts’s consideration, the fact that Education Boards are only trustees of money confided to them by the State, to be invested for the good of all; and that thinly peopled districts are the very ones that require generous treatment. This capitation of which we have heard is paid from the Consolidated Fund to Education Boards upon the children actually attending school, and if the Woodville children did not attend school, the Board would not get their capitation. Where, then, is the merit of handing it over? Rents from reserves and building grants from Government are also the property of all, and many a childless hard-drinking navvy contributes more to the Education Fund than the sober father of a family. Under these conditions, it is evident that to draw a hard and fast line is impossible ; and, if possible, would be unjust.

I beg to thank you for according me the space.:to show, as I trust I have done, that onr requests were very moderate, and were not fairly met;—l am, &c, G. A. Marchant. "Woodville, Sep. 18.