Local Government Reform.

Press, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20647, 9 September 1932, Page 10

Local Government Reform.

It is not surprising that the conference of representatives of technical education authorities now sitting in Wellington should have been led into a discussion of local government reform. Schemes for improving almost any State service in New Zealand are invariably hindered and frequently brought to nothing by the hopeless inadequacy of the present system of local government. Roads, hospitals, sohools, community planning schemes, tramways, drainage systems, and many other services partly local in their nature could be administered more effectively and cheaply if looal government areas had been enlarged to meet modern requirements. A year ago it seemed that the urgent need for economy in public expenditure and for a reduction in the burden of rates would compel the Government to introduce a reform that has been overdue for twenty years, Either inertia or the knowledge that existing local bodies are vested interests caused the promise to be ignored. At the end of last session it was announced that the Minister for Internal Affairs, Mr Hamilton, would take up the question with his Department and institute an enquiry. Though nothing Has been heard of the enquiry, the Minister has outlined a vague and unsatisfactory scheme for co-ordinating local government within the Provinces, provided the local bodies themselves are willing. The scheme, like the enquiry, seems to have lapsed. Though this is neither regrettable nor surprising, it is a pity the Minister has lost interest in the subject so quickly. His proposal to create Provincial authorities showed that he was thinking in the right direction; and a little investigation might have convinced him that Provincial authorities with a few definite functions instead of vague general powers of. supervision would have some chance of success. If the Gorernrniiit is too timid or too'UK informed to make sweeping' changes, its best plan is to test by experiment the possibility of administration by Pro-

vinces. As the discussion yesterday at the technical education conference showed, the idea is gaining ground that the Provinces, for reasons of sentiment and of convenience, are the most suitable areas for local administration.