The Auckland Star WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, The Echo and The Sun. WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 1936. GOVERNING AUCKLAND.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 274, 18 November 1936, Page 6

The Auckland Star WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, The Echo and The Sun.

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 1936. GOVERNING AUCKLAND.

For the cause that lacks assistance, For the wrong that needs resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that we can do.

The formation last, night of tlie Metropolitan Committee will, it hoped, appear in retrospect as the formal beginning of continuous co-operation between the local bodies which now divide the control of Greater Auckland. Such co-operation, as Mr. Davis was able to show in his well-balanced address to the conference, is being forced on the local bodies by common needs and circumstances, the pressure of which is certain to grow. Existing or anticipated needs and circumstances are different, not onlj in degree, but in kind, from those experienced in the past, and the system of local government which has served the community reasonably well, is not adequate now, and. will be less adequate in the future. It is not a condition of affairs peculiar to Auckland. The Local Government Amalgamation Schemes Bill, brought down by the Minister of Internal Affairs, was not designed only to encourage, and if necessary compel, a reduction in the number of local bodies; it was designed also in recognition of the fact that the local government system stands in need of levision. Mr. Davis named twelve matters of importance upon which the Metropolitan Committee could with advantage* deliberate. The list could be extended, but it seems only too likely that before the Committee has gone far in considering even the first subject the metropolitan airport —there will be a recognition by the delegates that the only powers which they possess the power to confer and the power to advise —are far from sufficient. \ With this recognition there may come a realisation that perhaps the first matter which they should consider is Mr. Parry's Amalgamation Schemes Bill. The Bill should not be considered only in the light of the blessed word "amalgamation." If the number of local bodies in the metropolitan area were reduced by one-half, by amalgamations, the difficulties surrounding the approach to such a problem as the financing and control of the airport might not be appreciably less. Mr. Davis indicated the greater, but more fruitful, task when he referred to the "amalgamation under .one unified control of the services of power and lighting, transport, drainage and water." Such a wholesale unification may not prove practicable or 4 es i ra hle, but it is for such a body as the Metropolitan Committee to study the problem, and if possible reach an agreed conclusion. Some reorganisation, Mr. Pariy has made it clear, there must be. Auckland should certainly desire a reorganisation on terms agreed on in Auckland, rather than one imposed from Wellington.