THE WAIMATE ADVERTISER. THURSDAY, JUNE 27, 1901.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume III, Issue 168, 27 June 1901, Page 2

THE WAIMATE ADVERTISER. THURSDAY, JUNE 27, 1901.

Waimate ought to ..be well looked after with two Ministers, of living close handy, —the, Hon. Mr Duncan at Oatnaru and the Hon. Mr Hall-Jones at Timaru. We do not know that in the past we have benefited to any , great : extent by the, propinquity of these august personages, but in future we may hope .that care wijl be taken to impress upon the Ministers of Lands and Public Works the imperative duty that lies upon to look after the interests of the districts in their immediate neighbourhood. Mr Hall-Jones has lately been' haranguing • his constituents in Timaru, and bis speech certainly was one likely to give a good deal of satisfaction to the bulk of the country. The hon. gentleman has had many hard things said of him since he became a Minister. Many thought he wbnld'“ g 6 under ” at the tim-j of the Marine scandal. He has been accused of weakness, want of backbone, shiftiness; evasiveness. Hast session of Parliament

Mr McLachlan, the erratic but, hard-headed member for Ash-; burton, -said the Government might «a well have a rubber stamp with the name of the Minister of Public Works on it, and stick it oa the departmental : papers and dispense with Mr Hall-Jones, for all the use he was. The papers have always found it a favourite amusement to %i slate the hon. gentleman. He was no speaker, they said. He had no debating power, he had no force or originality, he was no use or assistance to the Premier, the •Cabinet, or the party. Nevertheless the member for Timaru has pursued the even tenor of his w vy, taking all his punishment, if not exactly' with a smile, still without squirming or flinching, and,dhe vocabulary of vituperation being exhausted, people are now beginning to ask, “ Has the p >or man no virtue at all ? ” The true answer to that question is that undoubtedly he has* He is, to start with, an indefatigable worker. He slogs in his office aid at his work from early morning till late at night, and often till late in the morning. He understands his business. He is g&ot a mere ornamental Minister of Public Works. He knows about building a bridgeand laying a railroad as well as any contractor of them all. He cannot b) bad much or. cheated about prices. He keeps the strings of |;all the public works in progress throughout the colony at his fingers’ ends. No one has ever tyaard. so far, of the Department under his care having made a failure of any great work or hiving allowed any disgraceful jobs to.be perpetrated. All over the colony the Minister is leaving his mark in the shape of splendid roads, admirable bridges, well-

made railways, elegant and substantial public buildings of every class and character ; and all this is done comparatively quietly, without much noise or fuss of any kind, so, that to the bulk of people it hardly seems noticeable. But it is going on all the sarm-, and when the time .comes for the hnn. gentleman to rest from his labours he will be able to point north, south, east and west, and say to all who ask, “ If you desire to see my monument —the memorial of my years of office—look around you.” And truly it cannot be denied that some very tangible and lasting evidences of the work of the Minister could be found on every hand. Nor in the immediate years that are coming does' there seem any sign of diminution in the volume of public works. Some people clamoured, some time ago, for a £5,000,000 loan and the immediate completion of all the chief lines of railway. There was a great deal to be said for this contention, on the ground that half finished works could not be expected to pay and that the country was seriously inconvenienced by their non-comple-tion. On the other hand, we had had a shocking bad time after the “ boom and burst ” policy of Sir Julius Vogel, and we did not want to repeat that experience. Nor, did we want to flood the country with workmen who, once the work was finished’, would go to swell the ranks of the unemployed. On the whole, perhaps, the Govepfiinent policy was the [wisdft was. to borrow |njiuQlstely, at the rate of about .pJroO,OOO a year, and push on jpe work steadily, even if mt *very rapidly. Certainly all the railway lines seem to be progressing: now at a very satisfac-i tory rate, and the Government propose to proceed still more rapidly during the next few years. There is one thing to be said about the present Government—they seem to have their brads “ screwed on the right way ” in matter of pure business; they manage the finances , and purely business transactions pretty well; they generally have a decent surplus, and this year,’ with £532,000, is not going to be any exception to the general rule. •So with their land purchases and advances to settlers. They pan out pretty well. And now they seem to have struck anothergood patch on the North Island railway route in the shape of a magnificent kauri forest, which will be made to pay them very handsomely. On the whole, we think, we owe a good deal to the present Government for their management of the affairs of the country, and not a little to Mr Hall* Jones for his successful labours as , Minister of Public Works. Few people, probably, who. know the Hoq* the Miniflfcer

■iaperficially dr me.ely thro g the hum-drum work of his Departmeiu would take him to be a red Radical of the most advanced type. And yet, had he been Premier, it is likely, if he, bad bad his \Vay, that we should' have been considerably farther along the path of reform than we are at present. .A glance at the meesures advocated in his speech will show this. Were he able he would forthwith establish State coal mines, have universal suffrage j inmunicipalaud county elections, pass a Fair Rent Bill having rents settled by a tribunal, introduce the Referendum giving the people power to give a direct vote on ] all important questions, take fire insurance under the • control of the State, fix a, statutory eighthours dayj and nationalise the ocean and coastal carrying.trade 1 The mere contemplation of such startling proposals is enough to maks us poor people in the' country fairly gaiip. Yet It is quite within the limits of possibility, if we go on as we are going, that we may see all these wonderful proposals turned into actual accomplished facts, aud that, too, before very many years have pissed over our heads. Whether they would make for the general weal will be the next question.

In our issue of Tuesday’lust a correspondent signing himself *• A Less Rate ” took exception to the proposal of the Waimate Gonnty Council to levy a rate of 7-Bths of a penny in the £, and stated that the information given that the rate would require to be raised one-sixth if the unimproved value was to t)© the basis of taxation was erroneous. He also said that a rate of 7-Bths would yield a surplus of £1653, and characterised the proposal as excessive and unwarranted. We have since enquired into the matter, and find the actual facts to be these The estimated groSa income of the county . for the current year, upon a 7-Bths-rate basis, is £10,700, and the es imated expenditure (including this year an increase of £2lO in the South Canterbury Charitable Aid Board’s demand) falls short of that sum by a very small amount to go towords diminishing the county’s i indebtedness. I’he. policy of the County Council for several years past has been to gradually reduce its liability, as the following figures show t—At March 31st, 1898, its indebtedness stood at £7824; in 1899, £5738; in 1900, £5184; and in 1901, ■£lßo6. The rate being on the UNIMPROVED value, it naturally follows that it must be higher than if levied on the CAPITAL value, and while, in individual cases, the difference this year may be considerable, still the rate now proposed will simply be equivalent to the one levied last year. In the year ended March 31st l*st there was expended in the county on public works about £2OOO more than in the previous year, and with reference to “ A ; Less Rate’s” remarks about the ‘•high rate,” we find that the Government statistical tables re“ lating to local bodies show there are over fifty counties in New Zealand levying a higher rate than the Waimate County. With the foregoing facts before him, “ A Less Rate ” will no doubt be Willing to admit that his deductions were rather hastily liiade. Increased taxation, however slight, is always more or less unpalatable to ratepayers, but in the case under notice we think the county is rather to be congratulated that its finances are so well managed as to make the proposed increase such a slight one.