Evading Open Debate

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30976, 4 February 1966, Page 12

Evading Open Debate

By going against the advice of its chairman (Mr L. G. Amos) and appointing all its members, bar one, to the works committee, the Lyttelton Harbour Board is perpetuating a system which denies the public information to which it is entitled. When virtually all members sit on the committee adoption of recommendations at a board meeting become a mere formality: there is no debate, no reasons are given. All too often a one-sentence recommendation covers an important decision. This is not good enough for a public body that is in big business and whose decisions affect the prosperity of the city and province. It almost appears a subterfuge io avoid the Public Bodies Meetings Act, 1962, which lays down that where any committee consists of all members a committee meeting is open to the public and the press. It is surprising that Mr G. Manning, who represents a party that worked to have Transport Board committee meetings open, should be the one member to be voluntarily excluded from the committee. Mr J. Brand’s suggestion that full reports should be made from the committee would help the public to get the information that is its right; but he follows it with a contradictory proposal that committee meetings be held immediately before board meetings. If that happened there could be no full report. Time available would preclude anything but the sketchiest reference. The board agreed with Mr Amos that there should be a new committee to foster public relations. Its first task might well be to look at the board’s latest decision.