The Guardian TUESDAY, AUGUST 24, 1937. COUNTY AMALGAMATION.

Ellesmere Guardian, Volume LVIII, Issue 67, 24 August 1937, Page 4

The Guardian

TUESDAY, AUGUST 24, 1937. COUNTY AMALGAMATION.

Printed at Leeston, Canterbury, New Zealand, on Tuesday and Friday afternoons.

Ratepayers and residents of the Springs and Ellesmere counties and the Leeston and Southbridge town districts should take a deep and watchful interest in the wholesale system of local body amalgamation in North Canterbury, the preliminary negotiations for which were begun on Friday, when the Minister for Internal Affairs (the Hon. W. E. Parry) explained what were the Government's ideas regarding this important matter. The Minister suggested that the 21 counties in the territory between Kaikoura and the Rakaia river should be telescoped into four; no mention was made of the town boards and smaller local authorities, but it is presumed that they will be merged with their counties into the larger groups. Briefly, the Minister's suggestions were: No. 1 county, to be formed by Kaikoura, Amuri, Cheviot and Waipara. This new administrative unit will have an area of 4225 square miles, a population of 9197, and a rateable capital value of £8,258,091. No. 2 county, it was suggested, should consist of Rangiora, Eyre, Kowai, Oxford and Ashley, an area of 1055 square miles, population 9792, rateable capital value £6,135,----694. No. 3 county will consist of Malvern, Selwyn and Tawera, giving an area of 2145 square miles, a population of 5595, and a rateable value of £4,245,862. Proposed county No. 4 is the one which interests the people of Springs and Ellesmere, for it is to consist of Waimairi, Paparua, Ellesmere, Heathcote, Akaroa, Wairewa, Springs, Halswell and Mount Herbert. The area of this group is 970 square miles, carrying a population of 36,620, and having a rateable valuation of £16,717,630. While conceding that a certain amount of amalgamation— for instance, those of the smaller local authorities within a county, such as road, river, domain and cemetery boards may be desirable, and that there is no doubt that there are districts where two or three neighbouring small counties could join with beneficial results to the ratepayers, it is not at all certain that the regrouping on the wholesale scale proposed by the Minister is going to give the desired result. Because a county is a small one it is not to say that it is inefficient. It is where the area becomes a large one, where the sense of community of interest and personal contact is lost, where the council is composed of men whose knowledge of their administrative area is limited and not personal, that inefficiency is more likely to creep in. It is very doubtful, too, whether there is any great demand for such an extensive reorganisation; some metropolitan organisations have been advocating it, but the people who are most concerned, the ratepayers of the counties, have not demanded a change on such sweeping lines. In fact, wherever county amalgamation has been discussed recently the weight of opinion has been against the proposals. The Minister's remark that there was no hurry about a decision and no need for excitement was apt, for the proposals involved are the most important that have been placed before the country for many years and are capable of having far-reaching effects. The centralisation which it denotes will give opportunity for bureaucratic control, and it is a debatable matter whether such centralisation is in the best interests of the community. Efficiency is not always synonymous with public welfare, and

efficiency in doing the actual work of the local bodies to the benefit of the greatest number of the ratepayers is surely a more desirable objective than merely administrative efficiency. With regard to the proposed No. 4 county, the grouping does not appear to be very satisfactory; in fact, it has all the appearances of being an unwieldy area, falling into two distinct and diverse types of country, the plains and the peninsula. Although smallest in area, it has by far the greatest population and nearly double 'the valuation of the next highest valued group. Representation is likely to present difficulties, for the maximum number of councillors, twelve, seems to be insufficient for such a thickly populated territory.