The Lyttelton Times. THURSDAY, MARCH 25, 1869.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XXXI, Issue 2565, 25 March 1869, Page 2

The Lyttelton Times. THURSDAY, MARCH 25, 1869.

Aformer Superintendent, who had the good fortune to enjoy a wide-spread popularity, was fond of using rather magniloquent expressions. In alluding to the ultimate purposes of his official mind, he often made use of the term " continuityof executive design," meaning thereby, we suppose, a deliberate purpose of carrying out certain definite objects. It was to this ''continuity of executive design," by the bye, that Canterbury owes the tunnel railway and the means thereby afforded of turning to profitable account the surplus grain that might otherwise, probably, rot where it grows. It occurs to us sometimes to ask whether the present Executive possess any of that valuable quality described as "continuity of executive design," or whether there is not too much promise and too little performance in their ordinary programme.

On the twelfth day of last December, the Superintendent dismissed his Council with the usual benediction. Among the promises held out by the! Executive during that short session, by far the most attractive was the erection of a bridge over the Eakaia., Somehow or another, the public had given up the notion that the Eakaia ever would be bridged. Ever since Mr Doyne received that handsome douceur of several thousand pounds for drawing an impracticable plan of a bridge over the Eakaia, which was to cost, more than two hundred thousand pounds, the public had given the thing up as a bad job, and the squatters between theEakaiaand the Ashburton slept on in undisturbed peace. But at the close of last year, the rumour gained ground that the Government really intended to bridge the Eakaia, and the heartsof men rejoieedattheprospect that a move in advance would at last be again attempted. A bill to bridge the Eakaia, which gave large powers to the Superintendent, was brought in and passed. A vote of £IO,OOO was carried on the voices. A reserve of some hundreds of acres was ordered to be Bet aside as a township beyond the Eakaia, to be sold at a certain upset price, and an additional sum of £SOOO was voted for the bridge, contingent upon' the sale of lands between the Eakaia and Eangitata. All these very sufficient proofs of Executive design were passed by an acquiescent Council, to the great gratification, of an observant public.

More than three months have passed since the Appropriation Bill was enacted with the usual ceremonies, and .as yet there has been no outward and visible sign of any 'continuity of design' on the part of the Executive. For all that the public know about the matter the whole thing may have been a mere blind to satisfy their impatience. Not that we believe this to be the case. On the contrary, we have no doubt that the Executive were thoroughly sincere, though they may be unpardonably slow. Deliberation is an excellent thing, but, like all other good things, it may be indulged in to excess. The public have been waiting about ten years to see the Eakaia bridged, and it cannot be wondered at if they should now be somewhat impatient. Something has always occurred to prevent the execution of the work, and now people are becoming alarmed at the silence of the Government and afraid lest the promise should again be unfulfilled, We hope that these fears will prove unfounded, and that the present delay does notarise from any want of continuity of executive design, but from the prevailing slowness which attaches to all Governments, and from which the present Executive certainly cannot claim to be free. It really seems as if fate interfered to prevent the expenditure of the attenuated balance of the loan upon the legitimate purposes for which it was originally raised. The sum impounded as a guarantee for the construction of a railway to the North is likely to remain where it is for a very long time before any railway is made upon the published conditions. And now it appears as if the money appro priated to bridge the Eakaia was also to become a fixed deposit. While the grass grows the steed starves. We would urge the Government to remember that while they are deliberating, the prosperity of the province is slowly but steadily on the wane.

Modesty is a very estimable quality in itself, but even modesty may sometimes be out of place. When publimen, who have important public duties to perform, are bo very modest as to shun all public observation, then most decidedly the quality partakes more of the character of a blemish than a grace, Not many months ago a very important Act was passed through the Assembly, giving power to the Superintendent to appoint a Board of Commissioners or Conservators to manage and carry out the defence works required to resist the encroachments of the Waimakariri. Two delects have already become apparent in the Act. One is the nature of the appointments, These should have been by election of the ratepayers, not by nomination of the Superintendent. The other is the omission of a regulation making the meetings of the Conservators public. As the Act stands, the appointments are in the hands of the Superintendent with certain exceptions, and his Honor has appointed Messrs Harraan Peacock, Fisher, and J. N. Tosswill a Board of Conservators. No provision haviogbeenmade for the meetings to he open to the public, the Board declines to allow reporters to be present,alleging as a reason that the proceedings are only preliminary, and that such information as the members of the Board may choose to give will be furnished on application. Nothing but an overpowering

modesty can have caused Mr Harman and his friends so completely to misunderstand their position with regard to the public... In the first place, the business which has been placed in their hands is of sufficient interest and importance to warrant a large and legitimate amount of public curiosity with regard to their doings. But upon this ground we allow that the public has no absolute right to insist upon being informed of the doings of the Board, though, as a matter of courtesy, we think the Conservators would have done well to comply with the request. But there are other and most undeniable grounds why the public have a right to insist upon knowing what the Board is about. Powers of a very large and absolute character have been entrusted to the Conservators, which amount, in effect, to the imposition of direct taxation. The Board may levy a general rate of one shilling in the pound upon all the property of the large district concerned in the vagaries of the Waimakariri. Then the Board may levy special local rates where it pleases and for what, within certain limits, it pleases. The Board may borrow as much money aa it pleases, or as it can obtain upon the security of the rates. Then the Board is furnished with stringent and in some cases almost despotic powers over the property of the ratepayers and the Boad Boards of the several districts in which it is concerned.

No one can read over the Act at all carefully without seeing that powers are given which ought only to have been conveyed to those who are actually, by election, the representatives of tbe ratepayers. But as these powers are at present entrusted to irresponsible nominees of the Executive, it becomes all the more necessary that the public should have the only protection left to them—perfect publicity. We hope, therefore, that Mr Harman and his friends will not permit their native modesty to stand in the way of the very legitimise desire of the public. It is no sufficient excuse to say that the business is preliminary. We have known a vast deal of mischief done at preliminary meetings. The Act stipulates that the Conservators shall at once appoint an office wherein to hold their meetings, and it was a manifest omission to neglect to make those meetings public. We are not aware that the Board has complied with this direction. If so, we trust they will at once notify where their office is to be found, when they hold their meetings, and how happy they will be to receive the public as their auditors.