THE Bay of Plenty Times

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 3976, 23 March 1900, Page 2

THE Bay of Plenty Times

AMD Thames Galley Warden. Fhe spirit of the Times thill teach me speed.— hag Jota. let IT. Friday, March 23, 1900. The triennial election of a Licensing Committee has once more come and gone without exciting any great amount of interest though it has plainly indicated that the machinery of the Acts under which it was held is by no means perfect and that it is specially inapplicable to an electorate such as this. The election has further served the purpose of showing clearly that there are distinctly two halves to the district, which, however desirable it I may be that they should work to- ' gether in harmony and be brought much closer in touch with each other, are at present about as far asunder as they can be. To speak first of the machinery of the Act, we find it ordained that five men shall be elected to represent the whole district and administer the licensing laws therein with the assistance of a statutory Chairman. The Act requires five out of the six thus appointed to be' present at every meeting to form a quorum without which no business can be transacted. It needs but the most casual acquaintance with public affairs to know that this of itself is a most serious drawback to efficiency, yet it has been allowed so to remain for the last four sessions. It is premature to-day to state exactly the composition of the newly-elected Bench, but it seems evident that three of. the members will be residents in districts removed from 18 to 70 miles from the place of meeting at Tauranga, and there are therefore strong probabilities that there will often be either great delay in transacting the business or else great inconvenience entailed on some of the members) besides very considerable expense on the local bodies which liave to pay the travelling expenses. We are aware that locally many voters made this last a paramount consideration and reckoned that it was right and expedient that all the local members should be elected with a view to economy. On the broad lines of general utility, however, we cannot acquiesce in this idea as we take a more extended view of the duties of the Bench than we have heard expressed by a good many electors, and consider it must, to be fully competent to administer the Aots to the best possible advantage, have some further knowledge of the matters with which it is called upon to deal, than the mere official, and often we regret to say perfunctory reports of thepolice. This tendency of • the economical sentiment to have all the appointments centralised in place of meeting, is happily oounteracted to some extent by one no less objectionable. p©Th,ape in itself, but still tending to operate in the opposite direction, viz., the parochial Bpirit which leads each centre to try and get all its own mea in to the exclusion of any others, or in other words to entirely ignore any general representative scheme covering the whole district. It must be conceded that if Parliament thinks it necessary to have six men to deal with the granting of licenses to sell liquor in a district, it is the manifest intention that such men should be as representative as possible of the natural subdivisions thereof. This may be seen by direct analogy from the constitution of Parliament itself, as representing the people of the Colony, as also from that of our city and county councils, etc., nevertheless that bundle of incongruities and mistakes, — the Licensing Law, — leaves this most important point to be decided by the economical, parochial, generous or pettifogging spirit which may prevail in the different sections of a wide electorate. Coming to the second point alluded to at the commencement, viz , the apparent segregation of the two halves of the district, as instanced by the last 4 two licensing polls, we regard the action of the Waikato side on this last occasion as perfectly natural retaliation for the previous one, and though we cannot but regret the disappearance from the Bench of the former representative of the far east of the electorate, Mr Chapman, we certainly hail with satisfaction, on the broad grounds of general utility, the presence of at any rate one and almost certainly two representatives of the Waikato side. If the local bodies, who represent the ratepayers, find the burden of the travelling expenses too heavy in proportion to the value of the work done, the constitutional remody is to agitate for a change in the law and not leave the ratepayers, by mistaken rreal for economy to still further cripple the administrative control of a body r-hieh, if it has any reasons to justify its existence, has < ertahily none too many. As the next best thing to a thorough reform of the whole present defective system of dealing with the s-ile of liquor, we view with pleasure everything, however -mal), which will tend to a more peif<ct carrying out thereof, and j Ito the greater satisfaction of the , public, even though the expense ] be greater to the local bodies and the ineonveaience more to 1 members. 1 ______ < -■. . -

SUDDEN CLIMATIC CHANGES i Give you * that tirWl feeling.' Just the help wantrd is Wolfe's Schnapps. J A cheering oordial tbat restores ' mental and physical vigor. ! The mating: of the Hunt Clnb, convened for Wednesday evening i last, lapsed for want of a quorum. 1

The County Clerk notifies the appointment of Mr W. A. Bennett as Dog Registrar for tfae Maketu Biding and Mr H. M. Stewart for Katikati Biding of the County. On Wednesday evening the p.s. Terranora arrived from Whangarei with a mob of 147 store cattle for the Assets Board's ran and they were discharged on the Town Wharf. There will be no service in tht Presbyterian Church on Sundaj evening next. The Bey. S. Entricar | conducts the forenoon service anc [then proceeds to Te Puke to hole one there. We are glad to see Mr P. Langdale is back again and looking mon like his former self before his recen prolonged illness. . He inserts i notice elsewhere that he will resnmi management of his store at Te Puke recently in charge of Mr Galbraith on the 31st of this month. They had an unusual phenomenoi for New Zealand, on Saturday last in the township of Hokitika, in th form of a miniature tornado o whirlwind, which did a good deal o damage to property. Several build ings were damaged and many tree around the Recreation ground ii Cass Square were blown down. The autumnal equinox has arrive' but without the proverbial gales The continued lack of sufficient tain up to so late a period, is becoming serious menace for the winter, a though the country looks fairl; green and there are now heavy dew at night, there has been no substan • tial growth in the pastures to suppl green food for the winter months. The death of an aged Maori chief tsss of rank, Peti Te Hokohoko, c the Ngatihe and Ngatipukenga hapt of the Ngaeterangi is announce from her settlement Te Toketok< Welcome Bay. The old lady hs been laid aside for a long tim through old age and her peop] intend to give her a funeral befittin her rank. We are informed that it is profc able that the telegraph office c Maketu will be converted into telephone bureau and placed i , charge of Mrs Henderson, (widow c the Jate postmaster there) and the the Te Puke office will be made telegraph office to enable it to cop 1 with the increasing business whic is transacted at that township. Complaints have been made to th ' beadteacher at the District school c some of the children destroyin i fowls belonging to residents iv th ; vicinity. Some of them hunted ; fowl into the playgiound yesterda ■ and did it to death with stones an ', brickbats. The culprits in such case as this should certainly not t ' spoilt ' by a too gentle sparing c 1 the rod. . The Natives in the settlement around Rangiwaea have started cc operative stores on a small scale i ' their kaiangas to keep up a supply c > provisions. They are beginning t j find it inconvenient at times, owin r to bad weather, or pressure of fan ) work, etc., to run across in thei . boats to Tauranga for the purchaa ' of small supplies and so are laun chin I out in business on their own accouni t We are glad to notice that, th trade between this and other coasts ' ports to the north-west i? keepin, 1 up and believe it to be capable c ' further considerable development i r improved means of communioatioi > were available. On Wednesda; . night the p.s. Terranora took si: , fat steers, consigned by Mr W. T , Raymond, for Tairua, and two cowe shipped by Mr R, Seddon, for th name port. The Mayor acknowledges witl thanks receipt of one pair of sock \ each from the nndermentionec 1 ladies: — Mesdames Bendall, Kelly Roche, Bennett, Home, C. Brown > Sharp, J. Mcßoberts, B. C. Jordan Missea Johnston, (Te Puna), Fox anc Good ; two pairs from Mesdames H Tanner and B. McDonnell. Specia thanks are also due to Mrs Pottei and Miss Galbiaith who have knittec several pairs with wool provided bj other ladies. An old time identity, in the person of Mrs Ann Robertson, has been paying Tauranga a visit for the benefit of her health, after an absence of a good many years during most of which she has been residing at Rotorua but has also paid a visit to the Old Country, from which she has but recently returned. Mrs Robertson, after looking round the town, states that she does not see a great amount of improvement since the time she lived here. We have just had the pleasure of inspecting a four-horse coach, belonging fo Mr A. C. Gilman, which has been renovated by Mr J. Tebay, painter for Messrs Jones and Davoren. The vehicle has been made to appear almost equal to new, being painted in green and decorated with gold lines and white scroll work; the job reflects the greatest credit on Mr Tebay and for style and finish would compare favourably with , any city work of the same description. To-morrow is the two hundred and fifty-eighth anniversary of the discovery of New Zealand by a Dutchman. New Zealand is now pretty dear of Dutchmen herself and has graciously signified her approval of the extinction of Dutchmen in another little place that they were good' enough to discover for the use of the Britishers, about the same time. These are not ' pro-Boer sentiments' but merely matters of history; the British have progressed and want to keep on progressing,— the Dutchmen don't — that is all. While the cattle for Tairua were being shipped on Wednesday nigh on the Terranora, one of them taking advantage of the gate at th end of the race being open to alloy the beast in front of him to be swung out, forced bis way past the temporary rail separating the race fron tbe shipping pen and beforp the mai in charge of the gate could close it, plunged out and over the whnrf. After swimming about for some time tbe animal, which appeared to be rather wild, went ashore and made for the country, finally taking to the swamp on the west side of the Gate Pa. Yesterday several attempts were made to get him back on to the road but he succeeded in breaking bnck several times into the high teatree and up to last night had not been re-captured. The Admiralty, after careful te sts, have decided to draw the whole cf their colonial requirements from the Granity Creek Colliery, Westport, wbicb is turning out equal to expectations. A cargo has just been supplied to the American station at Pungapunps, and there are good j prospects of supplying other foreign i markets if the company can pnt out the coal Woods' Grevt Peppornint Cure for Coughs and Colds n«ver fails, 1/6 and 2/6.