The Daily News. TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 12, 1901. ROADING THE COUNTRY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XXIII, Issue 211, 12 September 1901, Page 2

The Daily News. TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 12, 1901. ROADING THE COUNTRY.

Reporting on the roading of the country, the Assistant Surveyor-General, in the annual report o! the Dspartment of Lands and Survey, says:—The year 1899-1900 closed with a liability for works authorised to be done of £303,149, of wbich there was at tbe disposal of local authorities £102,124, and there was entrusted to the staff of the Jdepartment £201,025. For the year 1900-1 the House voted for expendituie £433,997, which included the liability of the previous year—namely, £303,149. There wasactuilly expended during the year under review a net sum of £310,660 out of this vote of £433,997, and the year ended wiih a liability to local bodies of £143,860, and for work entrusted to the staff of the department £292,336, or a total unexpended authorities actually given of £436,246. On 31st March, 1901, the end of the financial year, the expenditure by locil bodies was £76,813, and by officers of the staff £233,847; the unexpended authorities in the hands of local bodies was £143,860, and of officers of the Lands and Survey Department £292,386. During the first three quarters of the year the expenditure was about £13,000 per quarter greater than in the previous year, but in the last quarter it was £9400 less. | It is in the Wellington district where | the principal decrease in expenditure ] occurred in the last quarter of theyeir, and the chief cause of this was, the report states, the continuous wet weather throughout the spring and well into the summer, so much so that it was not until after the New Year that the roada were in a fit state for traffic and for metalling work to ba done. There was also some scarcity of labour and teams, and higher rates had to b9 given for most kinds of contract work, local authorities in the same period being in active competition with the departmental officers for tbe same kind of labour. The expenditure on new roads and tracks in each district is as follows: Auckland, £37,026 ; Hawkesßay, £13,137 ; Taran?ki, €30,099 ; Wellington, £51,056; Nelson, £3248; Marlborough, £6839 ; Westlaod,£s46l ; Canterbury, £2201 ; Otago, £13,141; Southland, £14,715.