Less Talk—More Work

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 719, 19 July 1929, Page 8

Less Talk —More Work

Thirty Years of Council Sittings

BY the application of the closure, the City Council was prevented from completing its business at its meeting last week, and a great many questions on the agenda were temporarily shelved. History shows that city councillors always did have a lot to talk about. The volume of City business lias multiplied a thousandfold in 30 years, but the duration of the sitting remains about the same.

Ostensibly there is a time limit upon the duration of a council sitting. Actually there is not, because members may, by unanimous resolution, prolong the legal time for an hour or two hours as the circumstances of the moment require. They may repeat this procedure throughout the night until breakfast time if there still remains in the hearts of councillors a desire to hear further discussion. Of course, city councils never sit until breakfast time. Parliament alone enjoys that distinction in New Zealand. But it frequently happens that many brave wives are asleep in their beds before their husbands have shaken off the fetters of civic responsibility and laid their shoes quietly beside the black-out fire. Particularly is this so In Wellington, where the three-o'clock-in-the-morning chimes have been known many times to accompany the sound of motor-cars leaving the Town Hall after a council meeting. Civic administrators in Auckland enjoy more select hours. The council meets at 7 o’clock in the evening and adjourns somewhere in the vicinity of 10.30 p.m. A few years ago, in the regime of Sir James Gunson, the starting time was 7 o’clock, and councillors considered they possessed a genuine grievance if the meeting was not finished by 8.15. THIRTY YEARS AGO But those happy days were comparatively few in history. Thirty years ago the council met at 6.30 p.m., and although the agenda paper comprised a sorry-looking thing of three foolscap sheets —hand-written, in huge characters and copied on a duplicator—lo o’clock was the average hour of termination. At that time the City’s affairs were divided among two committees —the Legal and Finance on the one hand, and Streets on the other hand.. Short, hand-written reports were presented, outlining the progress of street formation, the selection of boot-blacks for street corners, the coming of sanitation and drainage facilities, and the fixation ofofficers’ salaries; and seven inward letters comprised the total of outside business transacted by correspondence with the council. Today the council order paper is a bulky document of 95 to 100 foolscap

sheets, neatly and closely typed, giving in crystallised form the work of seven committees and showing the working of well-organised departmental machinery. To have taken a personal and active share in this development of civic business is the unique experience of Cr. A. J. Kntrican, the present deputyMayor, who worked under one of Auckland’s earliest Mayors and who was assisted by the first town clerk the City possessed. Since the middle nineties he has watched the growth of the committee system, the engineers’ and other departments, and has shared the financial ups and downs of successive councils. SPEED RECORDS When Mr. Entrican first entered the council the City comprised six wards, each with three councillors, but on account of confusion in the distribution of loan moneys, this system was later abolished. The rates were then 2s In the £, and prevented by law from rising higher. The overdraft of the City was £30,000. Today only one account, the fish market, is in debit, though the rates have risen to 3s Hid in the £. Until a year or two ago the Auckland City Council met every fortnight, but on account of the tremendous volume of work it entailed, threeweekly meetings became the order. The town clerk's staff, the DeputyMayor says, is occupied for a week prior to the meeting in preparing the agenda paper and for a week afterward executing its instructions, while the middle week is well filled in the preparation and disposal of committee affairs. It is hardly likely, then, that however verbose members might become, a reversal to fortnightly meetings will be effected. Looking ahead it would seem that more business than talk must govern the city of the future. Indeed it is not too much to expect that in the dim future Auckland might equal the speed record achieved by the Wanganui City Council under the administration of Mr. Hope Gibbons, in disposing of the whole council business in eight minutes. In circumstances of that kind, civic administration of tomorrow might be arranged and disposed of in the lunch hour.