CHANGE REFUSED

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 869, 13 January 1930, Page 12

CHANGE REFUSED

INCLUSION OF DISTRICT IN BIRKENHEAD PETITION FOR ALTERATION The Government Commission which sat to consider a petition by a number of ratepayers of the Waitemata County for the inclusion of portion of the county within the Borough of Birkenhead has refused the request. Tile commission’s report has been received by the Waitemata County Council. The commission, consisting of Mr. J. G. L. Hewitt, S.M., chairman, Mr. O. N. Campbell, Commissioner of Crown Lands, and Mr. W. G. McClintock, district valuer, had to consider the inclusion in the Birkenhead Borough of an area bounded by the Northcote Borough boundary-, the Birkenhead Borough boundary and Onewa Road. The ratepayers on the petition were represented by Messrs. N. G. Swanson and F. Taylor, the Waitemata County Council by Mr. C. A. Cantwell, county clerk, and Mr. A. Murray, engineer, and the Birkenhead Borough Council by the Mayor, Mr. J. P. McPhail, and the town clerk, Mr. J. W. Cocks. Of the 23 residents in the locality, all signed the petition. The report states that the land affected by the petition did not comprise the whole of the area concerning which any alteration might be considered feasible. The commissioners were therefore of the opinion that the question of inclusion should be left to a further petition embracing the whole of the larger area. However, they were quite in accord with the contention of the Birkenhead Borough Council that the irregular boundary between sections 56 and 57 should be straightened, and they recommended that the boundary of the Waitemata County- should run from the north-east corner of section 56, along the eastern boundary of the section to its junction with the present boundary on the south-west side of Onewa Road. Concerning the objections raised by Mr. Cawkweli at the sitting of the commission, that the petition was not verified by declaration, and that only 11 ratepayers had signed it, instead of 13 4-5 as required, the report states that the commission had not given a ruling on this question, but had decided the case on its merits. The costs of the commission were ordered to be apportioned between both the Birkenhead Borough Council and the Waitemata County Council in equal shares.