HOSPITAL AND CHARITABLE AID DISTRICTS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9113, 12 June 1908, Page 5

HOSPITAL AND CHARITABLE AID DISTRICTS.

WELLINGTON AND WAIRARAPA DIVERGENT VIEWS. One of the tubjects upon which there exists considerable difference of opinion amongst the members of the Hospitals and Charitable Aid Conference, now sitting in Wellington, is that of the boundaries of the districts proposed in the Government Bill. Acting on behalf of the Government, the Inspector-General of Hospitals has done his best, and with some success, to arrange an adjustment of boundaries that will be generally satisfactory. In ceitain instances, however, the differences appear to be almost irreconcilable. In the case of the Wellington district the boundaries proposed in the Bill are the present boundaries of the united charitable aid district. This arrangement has been objected to by the people of the Wairarapa ever since the district was constituted in 1885 As it has been decided that hospital and charitable aid control shall in respect to districts be co-terminus, it will, therefore, follow, if the Bill becomes law n its present form, that the hospitals in the Wairarapa will come under the jurisdiction of the central board in Wellington. This is bitterly opposed by the Wairarapa representatives for the same reason that tin y object to the present inclusion of their district in the Wellington district for charitable aid. It is considered almost hopeless to expect an agreement to be arrived at on this point, except perhaps by means of a suggested compromise which would involve the payment by the Wairarapa district of a lump sum to the Wellington district to seiure the privilege of local control in-r<gard to both charitable aid and hospitals, reimbursing the Wellington district for the loss it would sustain through the cut ting off of a valuable area of country that has not to bear any considerable share of hospital or charitable aid expenditure. The other districts that object io the proposed boundaries are as follow Thames objects to amalgamate with Coromandel; Bay of Plenty to having Tauranga taken out of ir; Cook and Wairarapa wish to rtmain separate (but an agreement will probably be come to) ; Stratford and Hawera desire to remain separated from Taranaki, and Taranaki \vislv.T, thein to be included; Patea objects to being united with Wanganui; Marlborough and Picton wish to remain separate; Buller, Inangahua, Westland, and Grey desire to remain as they are; Ashburton objects to being amalgamated with North Canterbury; Central Otago desires to be cut off from Otago; and Southland, Wallace, and Fiord wish to remain separate.—" Post."

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