GRANTS OF LAND TO RAILWAY COMPANIES.

Evening Post, Volume XXI, Issue 94, 23 April 1881, Page 2

GRANTS OF LAND TO RAILWAY COMPANIES.

? A Christchurch telegram in another column states that " the Government have determined to introduce a bill next session embodying the principle of conceding land to the promoters of railway construction." As this positive announcement is calculated to produca an erroneous impression, and to do harm by checking the exertions now being made to fill up the share list of the West Coast Railway, it may be as well to explain that absolutely nothing is " determined "as yet. Ministers have under consideration the desirableness of introducing such a measure as that indicated, and it is believed that they are very favorably disposed toward the plan, but the question is still an entirely open one whether it will be carried out, or in what way. There is probably not much doubt that something will be done in this direction, if it is clearly shown to the Government that it is really desired, and if the publio prove their own earnestness and fides in the matter by the exertions they'make and the extent to which they support the efforts of the promoters of the various schemes. The ohances of the Wellington and West Coast Railway thus will still depend in any case on the Wellington people themselves.