GLOOMY SCENES

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 245, 6 January 1928, Page 7

GLOOMY SCENES

SYDNEY TOWN HALL There were gloomy scenes at the j: Sydney Town Hall, writes a cor res- j pondent, on the morning prior to the assumption of office by the new Com- ! missioners. During the past few weeks the j doomed Labour aldermen have wandered uneasily through the carpeted i corridors of the hall, morose and sullen. But these unhappy scenes were exuberantly gay compared with yesterday’s disconsolate happenings. First of all a small party of cleaners captured the Lord Mayor’s room with a vacuum cleaner, whipped the pictures off the walls, and the tapestries from the windows, and deposed the Lord Mayor. They proceeded to "clean up” the room for the new Civic Commissioners. Later in the day, as each alderman , wandered in, seeking consolation, the ' Lord Mayor’s officer gently, but quite j firmly, asked for their keys. These j

were surrendered reluctantly, and the aldermen gathered up their few possessions of books and papers, and the like, and renewed the search for consolation. Finding none, they walked out Into rain-swept George Street, like timid husbandmen, hounded off their nttic holdings by hard-hearted bailiffs. In a few days, with the expiry of the year, the last cruel blow will be struck at the dispossessed alderman, they will be requested to return their gold tram passes, token and sign of the citizens’ regard for the civic fathers In 1928 the cry of Fares, please,” must not be disregarded. The past few weeks at the Town Hall have been extremely uncertain . unhappy one day. hopeful the next, for it was sometimes asserted that the Premier's plans were doomed to failBefore this, however, the scene was vastly different. Each afternoon the Labour aldermen gathered in the Lord ! Mayor’s parlour, a place of hearty i (and free) wassail and cheery gossip, i Over a glass of Scotland's famous proi duct, or a cup of excellent tea. they discussed amidst cigar smoke the 'questions of the shining hour. I When the Government sounded the j death knell of the aldermen the scene I changed. The days dragged op to Christmas. The Chief Commissioner was appointed, and the Civic Commis- ! sion was complete, i The Yuletide was spoiled. The last sad scene in this unhappy drama will take place on Tuesday. | The formalities will be very brief, and. !so the Lord Mayor explained yesterday, the ceremony will be “without military honours.” By Tuesday all the aldermen will have vacated the building, with the exception of the Lord Mayor. What will happen will be something like the following: The Lord Mayor will arrive and sit in his office, all cleaned and tidied, with ink-wells filled and immaculate blotting paper stationed at various parts of his desk. Next the three commissioners arrive, and, upon being ushered into the Lord Mayor’s i*oom, and making their salutations. they will display their commission from the Governor. The Lord Mayor will shake them by the liand. pick up his felt hat. arrange it carefully and leave.