MR. MUNNS AND THE BOARD.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 282, 28 November 1929, Page 6

MR. MUNNS AND THE BOARD.

_ At the meeting of the Mount Albert Terminus Ratepayers' Association on the 25th inst Mr. Munns, M.P., said that he had been con-' tinually lobbying for the Transport Bill, evidently to the detriment of the Auckland Transport Board. He. admitted that the original bill of sixty-one clauses was whittled down to a clause printed on one side of a sheet of paper with a provision that the boards should be elective. It surely must have occurred to Mr.. Munns that a bill so emascu- J lated was not worth going on with, but he accepted the contemptuous treatment the House gave his bill so as to get, in the last : hours of the session, some sort of a blow at the Auckland Transport Board. He never informed the board of what was happening, presumably because he was intent on reaping a tactical advantage. But he complained about Mr. Rhodes sending a telegram which swayed the , voting against the one-side-of-a-sheet-of-paper bill. Mr. Rhodes gave a satisfactory explanation of his reasons for sending the wire. There is one point which does not look well for our Ministers—the Transport Commission of three eminent men, two of them imported at high fees, arrived at a conclusion about Auckland transport in a very able report, yet, according to Mr. Munns, six or seven Ministers, whom he ticked off on his fingers, threw the report to the winds and voted for his bill apparently because of his importunities. If in twelve or, eighteen months' time when its first term expires tfye ratepayers wish for a change in . the Transport Board they can get it at the polls. Until then let us leave the board to function in peace, knowing that if its members deserve to be thrown out they most assuredly will be at the proper time. G. R. STENSON.