LOCAL GOVERNMENT

Evening Post, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 44, 20 August 1913, Page 11

LOCAL GOVERNMENT

COUNTIES CONFERENCE YESTERDAY'S DELIBERATIONS. The conference of the New Zealand Counties'. Association continued its deI liberations after The Post went to press yesterday afternoon, the president, Mr. A. E. -Jull, of Waipawa, being in the chair. AUCTIONEERS' FEES. On the initiative of the Hawera County Council, the conference affirmed that the Auctioneers Act be amended so that fees be paid to the District Hospital and Charitable Aid Boards, instead of to the local authority, as at present. CEMETERIES ACT. It was decided :—"(1): — "(1) As the only money? received by many local authorities (including counties) from cemeteries under their control is from the occaiaional sale of a plot, and seeing that the bank charge a fee of 10s per annum for keeping a bank account, it should not be necessary for the local authority to open a bank_ account for such moneys, notwithstanding anything that may be contained to the contrary iii the Cemeteries Act. 1908; and (2) that in the event of a local authority not desiring to become trustees, and notifying the Minister to that effect j the Governor shall appoint trustees for a cemetery in the ordinary way." s COUNTIES ACT. Many remits were grouped under tl>e heading of the Counties Act. There was considerable difference of opinion when the Pahlatua Council moved : "That ridings be for representation purposes only, and that the general expenditure of the county be a charge on the county fund." In opposition to the remit, it was pointed out that the present system was optional, and that each district had its oVvn particular requirements, so that its representatives knew better than anyone else the best direction in which to expend the revenue. It would, for instance, be very unfair to rate fanners in respect of a sanitary service. The remit was amended in the direction of making the power permissive, but was defeated by an overwhelming majority. COUNTY ELECTIONS. . , _ Arising out of several resolutions bearing on county elections, it was resolved, on the motion of the president, that the Act be amended so as to provide that county councils may have an opportunity of putting persons on the roll up to within twenty-one days of the election. THE "RULER, OF THE ROOST." It was decided to endeavour to amend the Act so as to enable a trustee to exercise th© vote or votes for the trust estate irl addition to any votes he may be entitled to for his own private property. Certain delegates feared thia remit might give undue power to the Public Trustee, whereupon the president reI marked : " I don't think he will want/ to come up to Taranaki to rule the roost, for he rules it pretty well now as it is." A FINANCIAL PUZZLE. \ "It is generally read by only three ratepayers in. a county," •was the remark of a delegate in moving a remit to the effect that county councils should not be required to publish their yearly balancesheets in newspapers. Other speakers said that few ratepayers evei understood the statement of the finances, and the motion found unanimous tavour with the conference. VARIOUS REMITS. "At present all we have to do is to elect the chairman, pass the dog tax, and go home/ remarked Mr. H. Everett (Waimea), in moving that the annual meeting tor the election of chairman of a council be held at the first ordinary meeting after the second in November in every succeeding year. The remit was carried, the president remarking that it was simply a question of "different ways of killing a cat." By the adoption of a Taranaki County remit, the conference recommended that it be made permissible to enable a portion of a road district to merge into the county. Two remits from Eltharn and Ashburton respectively, as follow, were referred to a special «»mmittee :— (1) That the existing counties should be Teduced to allow for community of interest, abolition of toll-gates, and payment of subsidies by one county to another, (2) That in future no new county be formed Avhere Road Boards exist unless of a rateable value of (say) £2,000,000. Other remits were carried as follow :—: — "That powers be given to the councils of a borough and a county -whose boundaTies aTe contiguous to amend such boundaries by mutual consent in the came manner that the councils of two adjacent counties are empowered to amend their county boundaries." "That a vehicle license taken out under a by-law in the county within which the vehicle mostly plies shall suffice for within five miles therefrom."' "That provision be made whereby counties can make by-laws providing that the cost of construction and maintenance of crossings over road drains shall be borne by the owner or occupier of the land to which the crossing is necessary to give access."