TRANSPORT BILL

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 8, 4 October 1929, Page 2

TRANSPORT BILL

MUNICIPAL VIEWS The executive of the Municipal Association of New Zealand assembled in Wellington on Wednesday to consider the new Transport Bill. The executive, which sat under the chairmanship of Mr. J. D. Campbell, Mayor of Invercargill, took as a basis for discussion the memorandum on the Bill prepared by the city solicitor of Wellington (Mr. J. O'Shea), and yesterday morning placed its views on the proposed Bill before a Parliamentary Committee. The executive was in receipt of a considered statement on the measure from the town clerk of Dunedin (Mr. Lower), which asked if the new arrangement contemplated that the Transport Department was to deduct 5 per cent, from the fees. The question that arose was, “What will the new Department do for this charge?” Would it merely perform the routine duty of issuing the license as the Post Office now did in respect of the licenses issued by it, or would it take upon itself the further duties in respect of the administration of the Act?

“The general scope of the whole scheme seems to constitute a process of attrition by which the rightful functions of local government are being gradually absorbed by State Departments,” said the letter.

The city engineer of Nelson forwarded to the executive a memorandum iu which the following statement was made:— “There are two. points to which strong abjection may ba taken: (1) The gradual

filching of the statutory rights of local bodies. (2) The tendency to govern by regulations alterable at the will of a