PUBLIC WORKS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 289, 7 December 1931, Page 9

PUBLIC WORKS.

THE QUESTION OF COSTS. ESTIMATES EXCEEDED. OVERLOADED LAND. (Contributed.) Increasing and wasteful expenditure in times of prosperity appears to be inseparable from the existence of Government Departments. Railway deficits have recently grown to such alarming dimensions that drastic action is being taken to prevent further losses, but even now it is not commonly realised to what an extent cost of construction of railways by the Public Works Department .had soared. In the early days of railway building long lengths were constructed at £3OOO a mile, and £SOOO a mile was a fair average, but of recent years £40,000 a mile is nearer the- average, and 13 miles of the Kirikopuni branch cost over £1,000,000 sterling, i.e., about £BO,OOO a mile. Costly Drainage Works. But railways are not the only examples of extravagant spending. In the Public Works Estimates for the year, under swamp land drainage account, for one area the estimated cost of the work was £45,000, while the expenditure to March 31, 1931, was already over £BS,OOO, the excess being stated to be due to post-war conditions and to unexpected difficulties. For another area the cost was estimated in 1920 to be £98,300, while the expenditure to March 31, 1931, was over £213,000, and it is estimated that another £50,000 will be required to finish the work. The excuse in this case is that, "When the works were in progress it was found that, on account of the rock formation of the country, the works could not be completed for the amount originally estimated." Expenditure by local body authorities is not commonly regarded as being the most economical in the world, but it is hard to believe that a local body would have allowed itself to get into such a position for similar work. Two bad habits at least are responsible for the creation of such muddles as these. The first one is the habit of regarding the State purse as having a never-failing supply, drawn from other people's pockets; and the second one is the habit of the Government of raising loans for Public Works expenditure without specifying the works to be done or the amounts to be allotted to them. The first habit may only be curable by long processes of education, but the second habit should have been cured years ago. Another example under this same Swamp Land Drainage Account- is an area (still in the Auckland province) for which "the ratepayers' representatives asserted that an efficient scheme of drainage by deepening the rivers could have been carried out for £20,000 to £30,000, but on the Department taking over the work it was found that the scheme would not provide the maximum drainage possible, and it was found necessary to enlarge upon the original proposals to afford each settler a reasonable opportunity of working his land." The result has been that £223,000 has already besn spent, and the work is not yet finished. Two other outstanding examples in the Auckland province may be quoted. The Hauraki Plains Settlement, on which nearly a million has alreSdy been spent, has been carried out apparently without any estimate ever having been made, while the Rangitaiki Land Drainage Act, 1910, authorised the raising of a sum of £50,000 for the work, which was extended so that the original estimate is not comparable, but on which half a million, i.e., ten times the amount, has actually been spent. Cost Per Acre. At the present time schemes are being entered on for land development by irrigation and drainage, and it is certainly better to develop land even at high cost than do much of the useless work that has been provided for unemployment relief. But there is grave danger of continuing to pile up public debt far in excess of the value of the assets produced. In the Ministerial Statement it is laid down that "it is necessary that those engaged in promoting extensions of irrigation schemes should bear in mind that, judging from the experience of schemes at present operating, the indirect or national benefit accruing as the result of making water available to land hitherto unproductive, entirely outweighs the direct return provided by a water rate." One wonders whether the benefit is not local and direct, obtained at the expense of a national loss. For example, an area of 5530 acres which has cost £232,000 to irrigate, i.e., £4O an acre for water, apart from other developmental work, such as fencing, ploughing and sowing, may bring no more benefit to the country than an area which has cost £5 an acre to clear, before fencing, ploughing and sowing. The spending of £4O per acre on water supply benefits the locality, but unless the £4O is paid off by the producthat acre, the local benefit is obtained at the expense of the rest of the country. Whether the area to be developed requires drainage or irrigation, whether it has too much water or too little, if the land cannot pay its drainage rate or its water rate, it is a burden on other land which is making ends meet. And it to believe that there is not plenty of land available still in this country capable of being brought into production at much less than even £2O an acre.