THE RATE BOOK.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9025, 11 January 1908, Page 5

THE RATE BOOK.

(To the Editor). gir t —The opinion of the editor of the "Wairarapa Age" is apparently as follows:—The rate in question is valid, has been legally struck, and any informalities in the Rate Book are of no importance. Mr_ T. P. Martin, solicitor, of Wellington, who 33 opinion I haye, says: "In my opinion the rate has not been legally struck," He also says: "In my opinion the informalities in the Rate . Book can be pleaded as a defence when the rate is sued for . Here there is no rate purporting to be made for any given period." MiMartin is counsel to the Municipal Association of New Zealand, and to the New Zealand Counties' Association; he is the author of "Martin's Opinions ..on Local Government Law in New Zealand," and he is a recognised legal authority on municipal law throughout the dominion. —I am, etc., J. YARR. [We are not aware that the Borough Council has obtained officially an opinion from Mr Martin or any other solicitor on the subject. Cr Yarr lead 3 it to be inferred from his letter that he has personally souerht and obtained an opinion from the leading legal authority on local government questions. Before accepting the opinion quoted by our correspondent we should like to have before us the exact statement of the case upon which advice was sought. Whatever the result may be Cr Yarr's latest letter emphasises .the impropriety of the attitude he has taken up. It is an extraordinary thing that a councillor of the borough should go out of his way to point out in public a seeming informality in a way which might lead ratepayers to withhold payment of rates. The matter should have been brought before the Finance Committee in the first instance, and not in open Council. If hereafter there is litigation in which any ratepayer comes out defeated Cr Yarr alone will be responsible. —Ed. W.A.]