Alternative finance system sought

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32425, 12 October 1970, Page 4

Alternative finance system sought

(From Our Own Reporter) GREYMOUTH, October 11. A Greymouth Borough Council remit at the South Island Local Bodies Association conference urged the Government “to get to grips” with the important question of local body financing, “before the financial position of many local authorities become critical.”

The remit suggested that draft legislation “for some new and refreshing system of local body financing be brought down as soon as possible.”

Moving the remit, the Mayor of Greymouth (Mr O. H. Jackson) said that a committee, under the chairmanship of the Secretary for Internal Affairs, had been set up to consider alternative sources of local body financing, and should now be in a position to make its recommendations.

The Mayor of Blenheim (Mr S. P. Harling) said he believed that some statement on this subject could be expected within a few days tom the Government.

The conference gave its support to a Buller County Council remit backing West Coast efforts to have a much larger allocation of funds made available annually to intensify and expedite the rate of development on the IState blocks of good and

marginal land by the Government in the four West Coast counties.

In the Cape Foulwind development block of 9300 acres, 300 acres were already in grass, but at the present rate of development it would take at least 20 years to bring the rest into production, said Mr W. H. Martin, moving the remit. The conference also adopted a Grey County Council remit which asks the Minister of Lands to consider the appointment of a reserves ranger to supervise and develop the vast scenic allocation for such work. Concern that some Government departments were deducting discount from rates after the discount period, was expressed in another remit from the Greymouth Borough Council. The remit suggested that representations be made to the Minister of Internal Affairs, but it decided to refer the matter to both the Municipal Association and the Counties’ Asso-