The Daily Telegraph SATURDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1882.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3510, 7 October 1882, Page 2

The Daily Telegraph SATURDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1882.

At the last meeting of the Borough Council, Cr. Wall drew the attention of His Worship the Mayor to what he con- ! sidered a want of respect to the chair shown by Crs. Margoliouth and Price. The circumstan.es were briefly these : A recommendation of the Public Works Committee was before the Council, which proposed the appointment of a sub-com-mittee, to consist of Crs. Lee, Margoliouth, and Price, to consider the advisability or otherwise of adopting the optional clauses of the new Rating Act with respect to the property tax valuation. Cr. Monteith moved an amendment to the effect that the sub-committee be composed of Crs. Ellison, Monteith, and M'Dougall, on the ground that the committee's recommendation would appoint prejudiced persons. It was not made quite clear whether tbe prejudice had reference to tbe Act or to the preseut valuer. Cr. Graham, in seconding the amendment, made matters worse by a most uncalled for and unwarrantable allusion to lawyers, which Cr. Lee promptly and very properly repented, and withdrew from the Council. Cr Margoliouth, while thinking that for the ensuing year the adoption of the property tax valuation would not be advisable, took exception to Cr. Monteith's innuendoes. Cr. Ellison expressed himself to the effect that he would prefer seeing the committee consist of the whole Council. Cr. Price explained that Crs. Lee and Margoliouth had teen proposed for the sub-committee for the reason that the one was a trained man in the art of reading an Act, and that the other was a thoroughly competent and experienced valuer. Cr. Price said he would be glad to have any other councillor's name substituted for his own, but he objected to Cr. Monteith's recent habit of bringing forward thoughtless and sometimes mischievous adineDdments, which were, apparently, prompted by a councillor who obtained his living forty miles from Napier. Cr. M'Dougall then, in a long preamble, referred to tbe Bmallness of Cr. Price's brains, the littleness of his mind, and other matters that had as much to do with the business before the meeting as the Egyptian war, or the latest Arctic expedition, and this rambling nonsense not being worth listening to Crs Margoliouth and Price followed the example of Cr Lee and walked out of the chamber. And we venture to think that a similar procedure will prevail on every future occasion when Crs Graham and McDougall outrage propriety by vulgarisms and low-bred personalities. There was no disrespect to the cbair intended by Crs Lee, Margoliouth, and Price; it was a sense of their own self-respect that impelled them to withdraw. The result was this —that, instead of having a sub-com-mittee that would have gone intelligently to work in tbe matter required of them, and who would have been capable of bringing up a useful report, which would have been open to the Council to adopt or reject, the whole Council has been appointed a committee to report to itself nt its next meeting. No date has been fixed for this committee meeting, nor is it, indeed, very likely ever to meet at all. Thus a proposal that aimed at effecting a saving of expenditure has been burked. We say " burked " advisedly, because tbe Council as a whole is evidently utterly incapable of giving intelligent consideration to simple questions thai may be brought before it. Let us take for instance, Cr McDougall'. motion, that was seconded by Cr Graham and carried. " That in future the advertisements calling for tenders for all works estimated to cost not more than £30 be written ones, displayed upon a board to be reserved entirely for that purpose and fixed in a •conspicuous place outside the municipal offices." If the councillors who voted for this "retrenchment device" had the slightest acquaintance with the Act which they are called upon to administer they would have known that the law compels tenders for all work above the value of £20 to be publicly advertised in a newspaper circulatinK within the borough. We are sorry to have to write in this strain, but we think the ratepayers will find it very much to their advantage at the next municipal elections to ioterest themselves in the selection of their representatives in the Borough Council.