VIGILANCE COMMITTEE

Evening Post, Volume CIV, Issue 122, 19 November 1927, Page 10

VIGILANCE COMMITTEE

LOAN OPPOSED

A meeting of the Vigilance Committee was held last evening to consider objections to the loan proposals.

The chairman, Colonel T. W. M'Donald, said that the City Council had published certain statements, some of the facta being most misleading. He had drafted twenty reasons why the ratepayers should not vote for the loan proposals. He felt that the city's financial position was in such a state that not another pound should be authorised to be borrowed until there had been a thorough investigation of the city's affairs.

Mr. E. C. Lndwig expressed the opinion that the way in which money was raised and used in "Wellington was "something awful." The' councillors were in the position of trustees and citizens should get what they had paid for.

The chairman contended that the Engineer's Department, which was responsible for plans and specifications and the supervision of the works proposed, was so depleted that it was a matter of physical impossibility for the- remnant of the staff to control and supervise expenditure efficiently. From the figures he had. perused, instead of a saving in maintenance arising from bitumen, the cold facts showed the very reverse to be the case.

He stated that he had received a letter from a gentleman at Hawera to the effect that he considered the formation of the Vigilance Committee was the finest movement in Wellington for some years, and expressing a desire to become a member. Several business men had said they were heart and soul in the movement.

The council had tried to work a "slinter" over the by-election, continued the chairman. It was an illegal thing the council had attempted to do, and they admitted that if it had been found out afterwards they could have got an Order-in-Council to validate it. The thing was scotched, however. He also questioned the desirability of the City Council promoting Empowering Bills, which gave them very wide powers which should not be granted. For street widening they could borrow up to any extent without reference to the ratepayers.