THE Pukekohe and Waiuku times PUBLISHED ON TUESDAY AND FRIDAY AFTERNOONS. TUESDAY, AUGUST 29, 1916 GOVERNMENT HOUSE GROUNDS.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 204, 29 August 1916, Page 2

THE Pukekohe and Waiuku times

PUBLISHED ON TUESDAY AND FRIDAY AFTERNOONS.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 29, 1916 GOVERNMENT HOUSE GROUNDS.

The Official Organ ot . Tliei Franklin County Council. The Pukekohe Borough Council. The Tuakau Town Board. The Karaka Road Board. The Pokeno.Road Board. The Wairoa Road Board. The Papakura Town Board. The Waikato River Board. The Mercer Town Board. The Manurewa Town Board

"We nothing extenuate, nor tet down auaht in ntoKce."

For quite a number of years there has been a steady agitation on the part of a certain section of the citizens of Auckland to have the residence done away with, and the land on which it stands used as a site for the new University College. We do not fancy the group desiring to commit this act of spoliation is a very large one, but it has persevered in its clamour with a persistence worthy of a better cause. Although an excellent and spacious site has boen offered by the Government for 'the College in the Mt. Eden district, the clique who are obsessed by the desire for Government House grounds will have none of it upon the scon of its distance from the heart of the city. It is a strange idea, this of requiring the University to adjoin the business portion of tho town, and in most communities such a site would be considered anything but an ideal one, but we may let that aspect of the question pass, for Universities are not built to last for a decade or two only, and Auckland is pressing out so fast to the south-west that long botoro the prosont students aro nld mm Mt. Eden may wpl! he tho verv centre of tho town.

" The New Zealand Herald" has, greatly to its credit, always .stoutly resisted any ajtempt to interfere with Government House, but there is one complexion of tho case which does not appear to have occurred to it, aud that is that both Government House and the University College are really the possessions of the Auckland Province and City conjointly, and not solely the concern of the City. The country provides at least as many students as the town/ and is at hast as much interested in the retention of Government House, not only as a residence for the Governor during his visits to ,the North, but as one of the few buildings we have left that have been closely connected with the early history of the colony. We do not think we should bo over-stating the case if we were to say that the farmers of the Province are even more anxious for its retention than the citizens of Auckland. Not sp very lorg ago, when its furniture and fittings were getting so worn out aud shabby that they were nearly unfit for use, and the Government of the day could not be induced to spend money in renewing them, the farmers of Auckland Province offered to refurnish the place at their own cost, and so shamed the authorities into putting the work in hand. In the present Head of the Government (Mr Massey), those who favour the retention of the Governor's residence, and who we firmly believe camprise a vast majority both in country and town, will find a strong supporter. But after all hois only one of the Cabinet, and it would be well to strengthen his hands as much as possible, for the would-be annexers of the site are both noisy and determined, and have shown a fighting power wholly disproportionate to their numbers. We would suggest that the Executive of the Farmers' Union should at once take the matter in hand, and elicit from the branches their opinion on the subject, and that the Agricultural Associations should also represent their views to the Government. It would be a thousand pities if, just for the want of a little concerted action, we were not only to lose Government Housed but to have the College that is to serve not the present generation only, but the students of the centuries to come, cramped up on a tiny and completely unsuitable site.