MOUNT ALBERT AFFAIRS.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 222, 19 September 1929, Page 6

MOUNT ALBERT AFFAIRS.

"Disgusted Ratepayer's" letter in the "Stav" of the 17tli inst. is a timely one and certainly should make the average ratepayer think. The rates, as he implies, are extraordinarily high and should not on any account be further in«, creased by new loans. On a place that was purchased less than ten months ago for under _ £700 the total rates, etc., payable for this year only, including everything due to the ' Mount Albert Borough Council, are £15 3/7, orequal to 5/10 per , week, and the property has , no metalled road, kerbing or channelling and no sewer drainage. JOINT THE CITY.

"General" and "separate" rates this year in Mount Albert are well over a twenty per ccnt increase on last year, which is enormous, and quite a hurdle for a working man and family. Some people say that owners in New Zealand do not know what a good thing they are on compared with landlords in England, that rents are far higher in New Zealand. Remuneration to the owner may be less in England, but actually the tenant pays more, for he pays the rates as well, and in nearly every instance the house is one of a long row of tenements with practically no yard and less room for a garden, whereas in God's own country the tenant gets a nice quarter-acre section and the owner pays the rates. I am only one of thousands who are being burdened up with loans for works which, in some cases, for the timo being at any rate, are not necessary. PUSSYFOOT.