The Standard AND PEOPLE'S ADVOCATE. (PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY AND SATURDAY.) WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 12, 1874.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume II, Issue 195, 12 August 1874, Page 2

The Standard AND PEOPLE'S ADVOCATE. (PUBLISHED EVERY WEDNESDAY AND SATURDAY.)

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 12, 1874.

u We shall sell to no man justice or right.: W c shall deny to no man justice or right: We shall defer to no man justice or right.”

Recently, in the House of Representatives, Mr. Williams, the member for Mongouui and Bay of Islands, asked the Minister for Public Worka, if it is the intention of the Government to erect a new Court House and Custom House at Hokianga, to which the Hon. Mr. Richardson replied that, when the question of public buildings wan submitted to the House, the Government would make provision for the erection of the public buildings referred to in the district of Hokianga. We have already referred to the large rote of Colonial money which has been appropriated for similar work at Tauranga and Hawke’s Bay ; and we now propose to draw the attention of the General Government 'to the grave, and, somewhat unjust, distinction that is being made between ttiis port and the Olliers already mentioned.

It needs but little illustration, beyond the figures we are about to quote, to shew that the growing necessities of the port of Poverty Bay are not relieved upon any known principle of departmental administration. Even political exigencies are ignored in our own case ; whilst ministerial, and, perhaps, personal influence contribute largely to the invidiousness displayed in meting out measures for the public want. Hawke’s Bay has well earned the expenditure of a few thousands of pounds for the public offices that are being built in Napier ; but we again enquire what has Poverty Bay done that in that essential and important item she should be left out in the cold ? Some £4OOO too are being spent at Tauranga for offices for the General Government- service. By all means let Tauranga have them —we do not raise a word against it, except for the sake of analogy. Now Hokianga is in the field of public favor, and has received a parliamentary assurance that her cry has not been raised in vain. We repeat, by every principle of public requirement let Hokianga enjoy the possession she stands in need of ; but audi alteram partem, and let justice be dealt out with an even hand. It is notorious that the General Government has refused to erect public buildings for its own departments in Gisborne ; and the Superintendent has been informed, in reply to his advocacy in that behalf, that if he wishes them the Provincial Government must build them. It is also a patent fact that this port is miserably deficient in the accommodation proper and necessary for the efficient discharge of public duty. It is true that the Resident Magistrate has a decent Court House, to which is attached a half-grown Armory ; a Militia—cuanPolice —cwwi-Native, office, ill adapted for the business crammed into it; and a Custom House 12ft. x 10ft., round which the proverbial cat could not be swung without great danger to both cobwebs and red tape. For this scant accommodation the Government pays a rental of near £2OO a year. It is also true that a non-descript tenement, dignified by the name of Post Office —access to which, by the way, is only obtained by climbing over sundry and divers telegraph poles—has been built at a shameful disregard of economy, and which is as useless in capacity as it is ugly in design. These are the summurn malum of the General Government’s Departments in Gisborne, and the complaints that have been, and are being made, added to the sum total of our contributions to the general' revenue, warrant us in characterizing this state of things as one-sided and unjust.

Now let us see what claims besides those of official necessity, this port has upon the consideration of the Government. The quarterly return of Customs Revenue at the several ports in New Zealand for the period ending 30th June last, puts all adverse argument on one side, while it practically endorses the reasonableness of the views we now express. Taking the receipts at the three ports —Hokianga, Tauranga, and Poverty Bay, in the sequential order in which they appear in the return—we find the balance to credit largely in favor of Poverty Bay, thus:—

By this it will be seen that the necessities of the port of Hokianga are not so very urgent as to require the ponderous machinery of parliamentary action to put them right, especially in the face of the fact that its Customs receipts had considerably diminished in the June quarter 1874, as- compared with that of 1873. At Tauranga, too, the comparison is unfavorable to that port, as against the more favorable figures shown in the receipts for Poverty Bay.

Those who have no other means of knowing these facts will be glad to learn that Poverty Bay, as a port of entry, has taken up a position amongst the other ports in New Zealand which not only speaks well for her energy and progress, but entitles her to some attention, while asserting her claims. Poverty Bay, in the short space of 18 months has contributed £7095 6s 7d to t he Customs Revenue of the Colony (independently of many other sources of supply.) Whilst out of the twentyseven ports of entry in the Colony she has beaten many of them her seniors in years, and now’ ranks seventeenth in the numerical category. There are but sixteen ports contributing more largely to the Customs Revenue than Poverty Bay, while there are ten — nine of which were proclaimed in advance of her—which contribute less. We are not in a position to say, at this moment, which of the, above number have been adequately provided with public offices at the expense of the Colony ; but, accepting the doctrine of analogy, we do say that if such a port as Tauranga can command so much favor at Court, Poverty Bay has something more substantial on which to ground its prayer to the Government, that justice may be done to her. Wo commend this subject to the notice of the Parliamentary member for the East Coast, and to the two members of the Road Board, now in Wellington.

Hokianga Tauranga Poverty Bay. June qr. 1*74: Toll, tor vea ; £181. £332 £1008 £130 (No port) £337 £1356 £1033 £5120