THE CITY COUNCIL AND THE HARBOUR BOARD.

Evening Post, Volume XXI, Issue 85, 12 April 1881, Page 2

THE CITY COUNCIL AND THE HARBOUR BOARD.

The majority of the City Council acted very properly and very sensibly last night in adopting the resolution proposed by Councillor Logan, to the effect that the sum to be paid by the Harbour Board to the Council should purchase all wharfage rights in the harbour, both present and future. It was quite clear that this was the intention of all who took part in framing the agreement between the Council and the Board. Certainly it was never imagined that the Board, after paying the Council .£25,000, for which no consideration whatever would be received excepting a " goodwill " which was purely imaginary so far as the Queen's Wharf was concerned — because the Council had no legal right to make a penny out of it — should 6till leave in the hands of the Council the only thing which could impart any value at all to that "goodwill" — namely, the exclusive possession of wharfage rights in the harbour. Even if the Harbour Board could have been so insane as to agree to such a preposterous transaction, it is absolutely certain that Parliament never would have ratified the arrangement. It is to be regretted that the Mayor permitted his personal feelings to betray him into using the offensive and unjustifiable language which he applied to those members of the Council who differed from him on this matter. It was no argument to call them abject slaves and trucklers who were ready to go down on their knees to the Harbour Board, and humbly offer to come or go, or fotch or carry, as the latter deigned to command. All that sort of thing may do well enough for a " stump " oration, but it is utterly out of place coming from the Mayor of Wellington, acting in his capacity as president of the City Council, especially seeing that he plumes himself so greatly on the " dignity " with which he fills that post. We can sympathise with Mr. Hutchison in his annoyance on personal grounds at the transfer of the harbour management, but it would pay the city much better to compensate him for any loss he may sustain by the change than to let harbour matters go on as in the past. It is creditable to those Councillors who voted for the resolution, that they were not influenced by the Mayor's insulting remarks, but acted on their own judgment and in the interests of the city at large. ______„_____________