RABBITING WORK IN BOROUGH

Press, Volume XCVIII, Issue 28888, 7 May 1959, Page 6

RABBITING WORK IN BOROUGH

Council Refuses To Pay

After rabbit extermination work in the Diamond Harbour area, the Banks Peninsula Rabbit Board had approached the Lyttelton Borough Council for payment, but the council was not interested, said Mr J. Gibson at the annual meeting of the North Canterbury Rabbit Boards’ Council yesterday. He was proposing a remit that the Rabbit Board Act, 1955, should be amended to enable rabbit boards to rabbit borough council areas and collect the cost from the borough council. The remit was passed. The board had approached solicitors and according to them there was nothing in the act to make the council pay, said Mr Gibson. “Apparently there are holes in it a mile wide,” he said.

The alteration might not affect many boards, but it did affect the Banks Peninsula board, said Mr Gibson. At present the board was carrying out rabbiting at its own expense instead of at the council’s expense.

“They just weren’t interested,” he said. “It’s the first time that this has arisen,” said Mr G. B. Baker, chairman of the Rabbit Destruction Council. He quoted several instances where other councils had paid for rabbit boards* work. “If a country town or borough is within a board district you just have to serve notice, kill the rabbits, and collect,” he said. “Should we make a test case of it?” asked Mr Gibson. Discussion closed after Mr Baker asked for the matter to be referred to the Rabbit Destruction Council.