DEVONPORT’S BIG BILL

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 445, 29 August 1928, Page 2

DEVONPORT’S BIG BILL

COST OF MARINE SPOIL REDUCTION TO BE LEGALISED At its meeting yesterday, the Auckland Harbour Board received intimation from the Minister of Internal Affairs that he had consented to the inclusion in the Washing-Up Bill of a clause legalising the Harbour Board's action in compromising with Devonport Borough Council for the cost of pumping filling material behind the sea wall erected along Queen’s Parade by the Devonport Borough Council. In the arrangements first planned between the Harbour Board and the Borough Council, the latter was under the impression that any spoil removed ► from the site of the new wharf for “the purposes of improving navigation” there, would be pumped behind the wall free of charge. When the suction dredge had almost completed its work the Borough Council learned that none of the filling had been removed for the purposes of navigation and that the Harbour Board expected the borough to pay it about £3,200 for the expenses of operating the suction dredge in placing 33,000yds of material behind the wall. The bucketdredge later lifted about 15.000yds of material from the west side of the wharf, much of which was used for filling at St. Mary's Bay work. The Borough Council demurred at the claim for £3,200, and after much negotiation and several conferences regarding the interpretation of the clause, in the formal agreement between the two bodies, “for the purposes of improving navigation,” a compromise was effected, the Devonport Borough Council to pay £2,000, provided the Harbour Board could obtain Parliamentary sanction for the reduction of its claim.