POWER BOARD PROPOSAL

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25554, 23 July 1948, Page 10

POWER BOARD PROPOSAL

“This river-to-river power board proposal appears to have a geographical basis only.” he continued. ‘‘There would be little of an economic or democratic basis to justify its existence.

‘‘lf the residual municipal area, the city, Riccarton. Lyttelton and Heathcote was to be made into a single power board the surrounding boards would remain independent. The metropolitan area would become electrically a compact district in which planning for an overall layout could be commenced at once.

“The amalgamation of this residual municipal area into one municipal body of Greater Christchurch would achieve simultaneously a number of aims. It would unify the area electrically in the same way as a power board over the area would do. It would remedy the anomaly of a city without control of its port in municipal matters. The tunnel road would further strengthen the case for this proposal. It would solve one of the Dominion’s outstanding examples of such a number of small local bodies in a limited area. If the Tramway and Drainage Boards were included it would advance the aim still further.” The power board proposal offered one solution to the electrical supply problem. Mr Hitchcock said. It would not solve, but rather aggravate the Ic-cal body problem by creating one more body. It wqpld leave unsolved the problem of Municipal Electricity Department finance in the formation of a power board. Amalgamation of the residual municipal area into a Greater Christchurch would solve both the electrical supply and the local body problem, The city could then, as it had long been ready to do, give the benefits of cheap electrical supply to adjacent areas as part of the city. Nine local bodies would be embodied in one. Banks Peninsula and Malvern Power Boards would not

be affected and even by the formation of a power board their problem would be merely transferred to the board and not necessarily Solved. “Greater Christchurch had a municipal origin, a municipal growth, and should claim a municipal destiny—one clearly indicated and comprehensively helpful—amalgamation,” Mr Hitchcock concluded.

To Mr A. C. Perry (for the Heathcote County Council), Mr Hitchcock aid he did not think he was qualified :o discuss a proposal that a metropolian board of works should be established.

Asked by Mr C. G. Penlington (for the Springs-Ellesmere Power Board) about the effect on the board of the Islington area coming into the city. Mr Hitchcock said: “I have realised that it would be a bad blow to that board.”'

Mr Penlington: Do you think it should be interfered with until the larger question of electric power supply is considered?—l think that is a matter for the commission.

Mr Penlington said the power board would lose £22.857 in revenue if the areas concerned came into the, city. The total revenue was £67,940 in the year ended 1948. The loss, Mr Hitchcock agreed, would probably make the board an uneconomic area.

To Mr F. B. Stephens (counsel to the commission) the witness said: “We are often reminded that we are not separate from the city council.” He agreed that the profits from his department’s activities could not be used for the reduction of rates. The council was seeking to have this position altered by legislation. The Lyttelton Borough Council had abandoned any suggestion of interfering with the electrical supply to Diamond Harbour, said Mr P. Wynn-Wil-liams, and was asking for the supply from Lyttelton to Governor’s Bay.