THE Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR O'CLOCK P.M. Resurrexi. THURSDAY, JANUARY 13, 1881.

Thames Star, Volume XII, Issue 3758, 13 January 1881, Page 2

THE Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR O'CLOCK P.M. Resurrexi. THURSDAY, JANUARY 13, 1881.

"Iv you will state your requests in writing I shall be most happy to forward the same to my colleagues." Such is the stereotyped reply of the Hon. the Attorney-General to all deputations upon Thames,matters. The County .Chairmanin his position as cicerone to the new Mayor organised another deputation to the resident Minister, Mr Whitaker,-who apparently had forgotten that he promised a reply to the last deputation to him upon the Kopu railway question, and must needs be reminded by a deputation. It is a wonder that the old story of porsonal interest was not repeated, especially as the County. Chairman is reported to" hare said that. Sopu would presently have all the advantages of a port of- eutry—the goods wharf silting op so rapidly, and the unfortunate Harbor Board without funds to improve it. ]Sot a bad idea of the County Chairman, and complimentary to the Grahams - town people ! We should be pleased to aoe the railway constructed to Kopu, and see no reason why the Government should not at once proved with the work, but the great offence of this district in the eyes of the present Ministry is that we are friends of Sir George Grey and the Opposition, and that is quite sufficient to prevent any.favors being granted. These deputations are humiliating, and of little effect, serving only to give opportunities to Ministers to snub and insult the community. If the County Chairman and the Mayor want to show their anxiety to promote the interests of the district,

they might find more fitting opportunities than interviewing' the Attorney-General upon a subject he must know just as much about as those who talk to him. We object to such argument as that used by the County Chairman, and consider the Mayor should not have been a consenting party. The County interests may be advanced by making the harbour at Kopu, but that the impecuniosity of the the Harbor Board, and the bad condition of its wharf should be advanced as showing the Attorney-General that the time was ripe for pushing ahead Kopu, and improving the value of his property, we think, showed anything but good taste on the part of the gentleman using such arguments. If the Harbour Board meditates an appeal to the Government for , assistance to help them to keep their wharf in something like repair, or towards the construction of a new one, they may get for answer, "that in the opinion of Mayor and County Chairman the railway to Kopu should be constructed, which would at once do away with the necessity for the Goods' Wharf." If this sort of bungling is a specimen of what the Mayor is going to do for this community during his term of office, working into the hands of the County, and standing by while such arguments are used by the Chairman, the prognostication of many will come true, "that, at last the County had got a Mayor after their own heart."