Sir J. Vogel's Reply to Mr Macandrew.

Bruce Herald, Volume IX, Issue 802, 12 May 1876, Page 7

Sir J. Vogel's Reply to Mr Macandrew.

The following is Sir J. Vogel's reply to Mr Macandrew : —

1. I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 22nd April, in reply to mine of the 13th. 2. There are a few points which I think it desirable to reply to, others I do not refer to, because I consider that I have answered them by what I have already written to your Honor, or because they seem, to me of a tic quoque nature, and out of place in this correspondence. 3. I am not aware that in my letter to you I assumed that Parliament would render the Government more support than Governments usually anticipate. There would be no* strength in any Government if fear of a minority becoming a majority were allowed to interfere with the ordinary duties of administration. I desired to represent to your Honor that as by law the provinces cease to exist after next session, the General Government were performing only their duty in obtaining the information necessary to provide for the charge which will then devolve on them.

4. You refer to my action some years ago when 1 had the honor to be a member of the Ofcago Provincial Executive. I acted then, as now, in accordance with what I believed to be my duty, and I do you the justice to believe that you are similarly actuated. As you have twice referred to me personally, I may be allowed to say that I continued to aid the provinces, and to believe they might be enabled to survive, long after that belief was dead in the minds of some of the most active mea in New Zealand. No province has, in my opinion, contributed more to make Abolition necessary than has Otago, for it has refused to accept auy limit to its desire to expend money. That without the means at its command, it should have embarked in a variety of railway schemes, not content with the lines in progress from the Waitaki to the Bluff, from Invercargill to Kingston, and from Milton to Lawrence, sufficiently proves tho necessity for the j check the Assembly have imposed ; nor does this appear to have been done too soon, for, notwithstanding the largeness of your Houor's views as to Otago's capabilities, the fact is, that in order to find means for meeting the expenses of the next six months, your Honor's Government have had to attempt to make land sales of a most objectionable nature. I refer to the sales proposed to be made to runholders without competition, in deafinco, as I am advised, of the intention of the law ; and which, I feel bound to inform your Honor, the Government would have taken means to prevent but for the conviction that the Waste Lands Board would do so. 5. Your Honor's opinion of the manner in which the Provincial Government carry out their public works is entirely different from that which we are able to arrive at from the information at the command of the Government. That information is to tbe effect that the Provincial railways have been very imperfectly constructed. 6. I regret that jour Honor should venture to make such an assertion as to the cost of the Clutha Kailway. The Government have in their service several engineers of standing and long experience, and there is no engineer in the employment of the Province whose opinions are entitled to equal weight. Persons may always be found ready to express opinions, but I should have thought Qfcago had, from the want of competent engineering skill, suffered qult6 enough to make its Government cautious as to assailing the work of men of experience. 7. You certainly do not rightly interpret my meaning in supposing that I said our political institutions were' to be influenced by money lenders. I think the passage to which you refer clearly

enough expressed my meaning that the Colony should not commit itself to the expenditure of borrowed money in excess of the amount which those from whom it looked for the money were willing to supply. 8. Tour Honor's idea of making Otago an independent colony is impossible of realisation, fortunately for the people of that Province, who certainly would not gain by the proposal, which, as I have already pointed out, would mean centralised power in Dunedin and financial difficulties of a grave character. The subsidy proposed to be given to Dunedin will not injure the country districts, and will be more than covered by the _ savings incidental to the doing away with the Provincial Government. 10. I cannot accept your Honor's version of the meaning of Abolition, and you will forgive me for sayiug nothing but very strong foregone conclusions could, I think, make you persist in your opinion in the face of the information which has been afforded to you. I should be most happy to circulate the Bills which will embody the policy of the Government, but they are not fully prepared. Sufficient, however, has been decided to enable me to convey to your, Honor a very clear idea of the measures the Government propose to introduce in connection with Abolition. Some of the details may be modified, but I thiuk the particulars I am able to give will convince you that nothing approaching to such a thoroughly localised system of government has yet found p^ce in the Colony. 11. Provincial Councils and Superintendents we do not propose in any shape to perpetuate or to reproduce, and various departmental services, such as gaols, hospitals, the administration of harbors, &c , wo propose to carry on as we do the post and telegraph departments. 12. "We intend to introduce a Bill regulating the direction of the local bodies, its provisions being made applicable to Municipal, Road Board, County Education Board, and other elections. Such a measure will enable the Bills by which it will be sought to constitute and empower those bodies, to be kept free from much confusing repetition. 13. We propose a General Valuation Bill ; that is, a measure which will provide a uniform system of valuing property, and preparing ratepayers' rolls throughout the country for Boroughs, Road Boards, and Counties. This also, whilst simplifying the measures relating to those bodies, will provide a uniform system, which is much wanted. Tour Honor may have observed that a not dissimilar Bill has been submitted to the Imperial Parliament during the present session. 1-1. We propose to submit a Bill to consolidate the existing municipal laws, simplified, aa already described, but which will contain provisions to enable corporations to borrow, not dissimilar from Mr Ballance's Bill of last year, with the exception that the purposes for which borrowing is to be permitted will be more clearly defined. The road districts we do not intend to ask Parliament to legislate about this session, excepting to the extent already described. To provide for the local charge of education, we propose to introduce a Bill to continue in existence the present Education Boards until February next. The entire control of primary education, we propose to vest in the Boards. It will be the duty of the Boards to continue in each province the system legalised by existing Provincial laws. There will be one difference, for the Biil will provide that the inspection of schools shall be under the control and management of the Colonial Government. We contemplate making provision for doing away with education rates, and also with fees in primary schools ; whilst we propose that education shall be made compulsory. 15. The leading features of the county system we desire have already been explained. We propose that the country, exclusive of towns, shall be divided into counties governed by elective bodies, endowed with very considerable revenues, aud charged with carrying out largo public works. The counties will be distinct from the board districts, excepting that in a few instances where the districts already are of great extent an option will perhaps be given to them to become counties, and thus to merge into one the revenues of the two bodies. The present Waste Lands Boards we propose to continue for a time, but we hope to provide at no distant date for the addition of the elective element to them. We do not propose to interfere with the land laws, excepting that we may ask the Assembly to consider the expediency of increasing the upset price, and enlarging the facilities for obtaining land on deferred payment. The Lunatic Asylums we propose to keep under the direct control of the Government, with the aid of local Boards nominated by the Governor. A qualified Inspector of Lunacy Asylums has been selected at home, and will, I expect, shortly arrive in the Colony. We propose to devolve the charge of other charitableinstitutions uponthe authorities of the municipalities and the counties within which they are situated, giving to those local bodies a power of placing the institutions in the hands of special committeea or trustees, We regret that in some parts of the country these institutions are purely Government institutions, and we think larger opportunities for the exercise of voluntary benevolence should be afforded. The railways, aa has been stated already, we propose shall pass into the entire charge and control of the Colonial Government. Abundant reasons for this necessity have been, shown. 16. I desire, for obvious reason?, not to anticipate the fiuancial statement, but I will not shrink from giving your Honor some particulars. We propose to introduce a Bill providing for the disposal of the land revenue. This disposal will j be of thoroughly local character, excepting

that we shall submit, for the consideration of the Assembly, the alternative of a gradually diminishing contribution from the land revenue to meet the intereßt on railways, rather than provide those payments from an income and a property tax, as we are not willing that interest on railways in course of construction should be met out of borrowed money — the revenue must supply the means for paying Buch interest. From the first, the land revenue, which has benefited bo largely from the railways, should have provided this interest. It will be for the Assembly now to consider whether the unsold landa or the sold lands and current revenue shall supply the amount required. Whilst otherwise we propose to thoroughly localise the land revenue, we also intend that Road Districts and Counties shall be guaranteed by the consolidated revenue the receipt of their appointed subsidies, irrespective of whether or not the land revenue of the particular Provincial district, supplies for the time being the necessary amount. 17. Your Honor will, 1 hope, consider that in the particulars 1 have given you, I have not displayed undue reticence. 1 should be glad to find that these particulars will lead you to support the policy they embody, and I feel sufficiently assured of your Honor's generosity to believe that you will not object to being the medium of disseminating throughout Otago information which 1 confidently believe will more than satisfy everyone iv the Province who is not prejudiced beyond the possibility of exercising freedom of judgment. At any rate the information 1 have given you will undeceive those in the Province who are opposing Abolition under a total niisapprehensiou of its nature, and of the consequences which will follow to the majority of the people of Otago. What we now propose will mean the realisation of the aspirations of many years. 18. I reciprocate your Honor's kindly remarks. I hope I have not eaid anything calculated to cause you personal annoyance, and I fully recognise, even where I am unable to agree with you, your Honor's public-spirited desire to promote the advancement of Otago and New Zealand, Were you a member of the Colonial Government for three months, I am convinced that you would cease to doubt the necessity of upholding the law which has decreed the Abolition of the Provinces.