OUR MUNICIPAL RULERS.

Press, Volume LVII, Issue 10759, 12 September 1900, Page 5

OUR MUNICIPAL RULERS.

THEIR CRITICS CRITICISED

Occasion was taken by Mr T. H. Davey, Mayor of St. Albans, on the opening of the new Borough Council chambers, to refer to the recent criticisms of our municipal rulers. Mr Davey said he had endeavoured during his term of office to do his duty to the ratepayers who elected him. He knew that it was impossible to please everybody, and mayor and councillors sometimes got a "slating," and they had got it recently in the newspapers, and got it pretty hot. They could, however, afford to laugh at newspapers whose columns were a great deal muddier than the Papanui road. (Laughter and applause.) In absolute fairness they should be treated fairly, and some little enquiry- should be made before they were "slanged" injtbe newspapers. They were told that better men were wanted to govern our municipal bodies, but it was difficult to draw the line between intelligence and the better class of man. It _id not follow that a man was intelligent because he was in business—very often it was t_e man working for the business man who made the business. Not one man in the St. Albans Borough Council had ever tried to do anything for himself, but had done all for the people he represented, and it was very, very hard that they should be referred to in the* columns of a leading journal in New Zealand as "dunderheaded.' He did not think that it was fair for any editor to speak of men elected by the ratepayers— elected by intelligent ratepayers —as "dunderheaded." They (the newspapers) did not tell them what was waUrted, but only referred to the awful state a certain road was in. He wondered what they (the newspapers) would do if they had no money? Referring to the improvements made in the borough, including a large water cart costing £90 and the attempts being made to obtain a road roller, he said that the newspapers did not give one credit for trying to get anything done, but thought only of blackguarding those elected by intelbgent ratepayers. Concluding he "said he felt it due to his Council and those gentlemen present to defend them from such attacks.

Or. Morgan was of opinion that the better a man was in his business the worse councillor he was. He did not claim to be very successful in his own business, but he studied the ratepayers.

Mr T. S. Weston, referring to the Mayor's remarks, pointed out the criticisms he had dealt so caustically with were after all the remarks of a sinsde individual, and it might be that that individual had gone more by hearsay than observation. He thought the Mayor ar.d councillors could rest satisfied with this—TJy your works ye shall be judged."