The Daily Telegraph TUESDAY, DECEMBER 5, 1882.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3559, 5 December 1882, Page 2

The Daily Telegraph TUESDAY, DECEMBER 5, 1882.

Mr F. Sutton, M.H.R., has addressed a strongly worded letter to the Hon. the Colonial Secretary on the subject of the very unsatisfactory state of affairs that has been brought about by the Government in reference to the Napier Hospital. Mr Suttoa calls the attention of the Minister to the policy of the Government as declared in the Financial Statement, namely, that during this year the Government would provide out of the consolidated fund for the whole of the cost of the maintenance of hospitals. In accordance with that policy a sum was put upon the estimates to provide for this expenditure. The Government for years past have paid all the expenses of building and maintenance at Dunedin, Wellington, Christcburcb, and other places. At Wellington the Government paid something like £45,000 for building the hospital, and £5000 for furniture, besides covering the cost of maintenance. No such thing as a public subscription has been asked for at Wellington, neither do the local bodies contribute a penny towards the hospital. Mr Sutton then goes on to say : —" It is not my place here to discuss the political question of the advisability of the course that the Government elected to take, but I do feel it incumbent on me to take exception of the most definite kind to a statement in your late letter to the Chairman of the Hospital Coiimittee, ' that the Government were not prepared to pay the entire cost of the maintenance of the Hospital.' This was part of the policy of the Government, and, I take it, the House and the country will expect that they shall, in accordance with their proposal, pay the whole of the cost of maintenance." Mr Sutton then goes on to state that the Napier Hospital Committee having funds in hand, mainly contributed from private subscriptions and local contributions, continued to pay out of those funds for the maintenance of the institution for the first six months of the financial year. It is now found necessary to enlarge the Hospital, and the Committee ask—as they have certaiuly the right to ask—the Government to refund the money so paid away, and which, in accordance with the Ministerial policy, should have been paid by the Colonial Treasurer. Mr Sutton explains that Dr. Spencer, in his uegotiatioa with the Colonial Secretary, calculated upon this refund when he proposed that the Government and the Committee should each provide £3000 for building and maintenance. " I cannot see," says Mr Sutton, " how any amount of official circumlocution can get out of the fact that the maintenance of the Hospital, being in accordance with the Government policy, a colonial charge from March 31, should be paid by the Government. A portion of that amount, about £1500, has been paid by the Committee, who, no doubt, trusted to the honor of the Government to repay them what they had advanced on Govemmeut account. The Government cannot expect that, while they find it their duty to erect, furnish, and maintain large and commodius hospitals at wealthy centres like Auckland, Dunedin, Christchurcb, and Wellington, where neither private nor public funds are raised, that we ia Napier shall put our hands in our pockets to pay for what our wealthier neighbors get the Government to do for them." After referring to the amounts that have been raised here by subscriptions and by the votes of the local bodies, Mr Sutton concludes his trenchant letter to the Colonial Secretary in the following words: — " You have by your policy crushed out private benevolence unless it is given in aid of the Government. You have in effect said, 'in large places where the hospitals are commodious and expensive they shall be supported by the Government, but in Hawke's Bay we are proud to see that the people will help us.' The Hawke's Bay people have never shirked their fair responsibility, and are quite prepared to accept it" now. But they will not accept responsibilities that are not cast upon other communities. The Committee have asked lor only that to which they are entitled, and I trust we shall hear no more of the uugenerous excuses that the Government are urging to evade a liability they assumed, as I believe, quite voluntarily and eomewhat indiscreetly.'