HAAST PASS ROAD

Press, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 26121, 25 May 1950, Page 6

HAAST PASS ROAD

DEPUTATION ASKS FOR

COMPLETION

ASSURANCE GIVEN BY PRIME MINISTER ‘ From Our Own Reporter WELLINGTON, May 24. The construction of the uncompleted link of the Haast Pass road from Lake Paringa to Makarora, on the Otago side, was urged by a combined West Coast - Otago - Southland deputation which waited on the Prime Minister (Mr Holland) and the Minister of Works (Mr W. S. Goosman) this morning. Mr Holland told the deputation that the work could not be done this year, but that it would be prosecuted once difficulties relating to finance, manpower, machinery, and materials had been overcome. The deputation comprised Messrs F. F. Boustridge. Mayor of Greymouth, M. Wallace, a member of the Westland County Council, J. Saunders, honorary secretary cf the Westland District Progress League. J. G. Barnes, a member of the Dunedin City Council, and G. F. M. Stewart, a member of the Invercargill City Council. The Commissioner of Works (Mr E. R. McKillop) also heard its representations.

The deputation said that there was a great need for the completion of the Haast Pass road, which it said was the one incomplete major link in New Zealand’s main highways system. It contended that the completion of this work would prove of undoubted value to the whole Dominion, not only from the tourist angle, but also because of the scope it offered for huge land development and the opening of huge tracts of indigenous timber forests at present untouched. Replying to the deputation. Mr Holland said that he considered a great deal of good was being accomplished by the visit of a delegation with firsthand knowledge of the situation. The material submitted by the deputation would be of great assistance to members of the Cabinet in considering the requirements of the provinces. There was no need for him to be personally convinced of the great potential resources of Westland and the area that would be opened by the completion of the Haast Pass road, for he knew of this from his own personal knowledge. He sincerely regretted having to tell the deputation that the work could not possibly be attempted this year. He could give the deputation an assurance, however, that he was fully convinced that the road must go through at the earliest possible moment. It would be undertaken as soon as problems of finance, manpower, machinery. and materials could be overcome. At present a skeleton woiks party was stationed at the western end of the Haast Pass section. This party was maintaining the existing road and was also doing a little construction. When the work could be undertaken it would be pushed ahead vigorously.