MOUNT COOK GAOL.

Evening Post, Volume L, Issue 38, 13 August 1895, Page 4

MOUNT COOK GAOL.

TO THE SDtTOB. Sill — Kindly permit me to say a few words in reply to your sub-leader in Saturday's issue. I know yonr space is limited, so I shall endeavour to be brief. In the first plarse, the colony does not need a central prison. Replying to a deputation in 1885, the then Premier (Sir Robert Stout) Baid he had looked np official documents and could find no gronnd for the statement that the Monnt Cook gaol was to be a colonial prison, for Wellington had not been granted anything for gaol pnrposes that had not been granted also to Wanganni, New Flymonth, Anckland, and Lyttelton. Wellington does noti want to congregate all the worst criminals in New Zealand at Mount Cook, and then liberate them in her streets when their terms expire. Eaoh provincial gaol has sufficient accommodation for all local criminals. The faot that less than one-sixth' of the building is now ereoted (the posterior or southern of .four wings radiating from a large amphitheatre), and. that the bnilding was in its present state of incompletion (no looks on the doors, no flooring, &o.) four oc five years ago, emphatically answers tho question whether it is needed or not. Until about five years ago prison labour was lavishly expendod upon it, but the next step in its progress towards completion required money, and this step has not been taken. It is not needed as a gaol, and if it were needed, it is entirely unsnited for any such purpose. The time is fast approaching , when . there will, not be, suitable work , in .. the oentre of our oity for the large -body of oriminals now. employed on Monnt Cook Reserve. The city, ia condensing ronnd that area, and w.ork mnst be fonnd in the outskirts of the town. It would ' then be impossible, as well as unwise coo- . nomioally and morally, to tramp them to and fro throngh the city. The faot that you cannot see any " eooial or moral injury " to the community in the existence 'of aneh a | building in its oentre ia a strong argument in favour of its removal. We do not want thai all, and especially our rising generation, Bhonld be similarly inured to a sight that fills visitors and strangers , with '. diEguat. Every distingaiaheel -vfsHsor to our city heaps upon us ridicule and reproach, and condemns us absolutely for snf- ' fering such a bnilding to exist. The Bishop J of Salisbury, writing from Wellington, ' said :— " A terrible mistake in point of taste ' has been made in oconpying the finest site 1 of all— an eminence comparable to the ■ Acropolis at Athens, or the Castle Hill of 1 Edinburgh— with the gaol for long-sentence ? prisoners. A gaol is a disagreeable objeot ' both to the eye and the mind, bnt I never 1 saw one .more obtruded npon the attention s