Evening post. WEDNESDAY, JULY 2, 1879.

Evening Post, Volume XVIII, Issue 2, 2 July 1879, Page 2

Evening post. WEDNESDAY, JULY 2, 1879.

THE KAITANGATA RELIEF FUND. + Wellington contributed about onefifteenth part of the magnificent total sum which haa been raised within the Colony for the relief of the widows and orphans of those who lost their lives in the disastrous Kaitangata Colliery explosion. Wellington therefore most undoubtedly is entitled to have a little voice in tha distribution of the money. So long as it was proposed to devote the whole to the Bpecific object for which it was raised, there was no reason to interfere ; but when we find a so-called meeting of subscribers, at which fewer than forty individuals, out of the many hundreds of contributors who have helped to swell the total to nearly £16,000, were present, coolly resolving to divert a large proportion of the money to totally different purposes, it is certainly time for subscribers elsewhere to raise their voice. I When the appeal was made by the Dunedin Committee to the Colony it waa stated that £10,000 would be required to provide for those left destitute. {Something between £15,000 and £16,000 has been subscribed, and the Dunedin Committee therefore have taken it upon themselves to determine that this money shall be invested as a kind of National Mining Accident Fond, on which the Kaitangata people are, we understand, to be the first pensioners. We have not a word of objection to raise to the establishment of such a f nnd. Had the suggestion been made in the first instance, when the necessity for such a fund was demonstrated by the Kaitangata disaster, we have no doubt the Colony would have responded to it as readily as it did to the appeal actually made. We protest, however, against afterthoughts in a matter of this kind. Every penny of this money waa contributed for a specific and distinct purpose. Every subscriber gave with the full knowledge that a week, or a month, or a year afterwards he might be called upon to give again to the sufferers by a like disaster. The Dunedin Committee have no right to measure and define the extent of the charity of the people of New Zealand. Theyseem to be so astounded at finding such a sum as £15,090 subscribed in a few weeks that they done know what to do, and they have rashly assumed that no matter what accidents may occur hereafter no money ia likely to be forthcoming for the relief of the sufferers. "The quality of mercy is not strained," in New Zealand at least, and we are confident that if the like necessity again unhappily arose, a similar noble response would ba made by the Colony to the appeal. But people like to know what they are giving to. They do not like to see the money they have given for one object devoted to another without their even being asked to assent to the~ehange. We venture to say that if the proposed diversion of funds is carried out in this instance, a very cold reply will be given by other parts of the Colony to any further charitable appeals emanating from Dunedin. It must not be understood that we desire to see a single penny wasted on the Kaitangata sufferers. if for £10,000 the widows and orphans can be provided for as well as they would have been had their husbands and fathers lived, then not a penny more should be expended on them. People did not subscribe to provide luxuries for them. The money was given to relieve genuine distress. The Dunedin Committee or the Danedin subscribers, however, have no legal, moral, or equitable right to seize on the balance and devote it to another object, no matter how laudable that object may be. If £10,000 meets the requirements of the Kaitangata case, and the Committee have £5000 more in hand, their proper course would have been to send a circular to every collector, stating that there was in hand a surplus of one-third, and offering to return that proportion on each contributory list, to be dealt with by the local subscribers. This offer might legitimately enough have been accompanied by a suggestion as to the desirableness of handing over the balance to a general fund, and in the majority of instances, no doubt, the suggestion would have been accepted, although in others the subscribers might have determined that their proportion of the surplus might be better devoted to other objects. It is a piece of the most unwarrantable presumption on the part of a few Dunedia subscribers to determine on an entire change of the method of dealing with the whole fund, and it is a presumption which every part of the Colony outside of Dunedin will probably most warmly recent. Already, Christchurch and other place* have raised a Btrong protest against the proposed on-

profitable misapplication of the fond, and we trußfc that those gentlemen who have the money will heatyate before dealing with it in a manner which will 'certainly make the jcharit^bly disposed feel that they have to "some extent been deceived, and that their money hy been obtained under false pretences. A National Mining Accident -Fund, started in such 4 manner as is proposed, is certainly never likely to become a popular charity, --or to awelL finuch beyond its original limits A great wrong will be done if ttife Dunedin people act as they avow their intention of doing — a wrong for which many innocent people ¦who may hereafter be forced on the charity :«f the Colony will probably have to suffer.