NATIVE RATES

Evening Post, Volume CXVII, Issue 51, 1 March 1934, Page 5

NATIVE RATES

"I WILL NOT PAY"

MAORI WOMAN'S LETTER

A short and emphatic letter from a Maori landowner was read by the chairman at this month's meeting of the Waiapu County Council (states the Tokomaru Bay correspondent of the Auckland "Star"), It would appear to bo yet another echo of the. recent gathering at "Waitangi. The letter was •as4 follows: — '* . . . "I- am stating clfiarly that I will not pay rates as you wrote to do so, oii account of firstly, there is no council road to my residence; and secondly, the Treaty of Waitangi, which I have signed, you must understand, states that all Maoris are not entitled to pay iates. Furthermore is not necessary, as this is final. Signedj Mrs. M. Hikitapua.'' A gasp was heard as the chairman (Mr. D. W. W. Williams) reached the letter's dictatorial"" climax. It was quickly decided to'send a copy of the letter to the member' for the district, Mr. K. S. Williams, with a covering letter asking him what took place regarding rating discussion, at Waitangi recently. It was also decided that :a copy of the letter should be forwarded | to the Prime Minister, and Mr. B. G., Sherwood-Hale was insistent that the ] original should be carefully preserved in the archives of tho council, or framed. | Questions were asked at the meeting regarding tho fact - that, although ap-' proached on the subject, the authorities concerned had not had the courtesy to ' apply to the council for a building permit for the new meeting-house erected ' in Tokomaru Bay, and officially opened when the.Earotongans were in the dis.trict. Miles of water-pipe~ line had" been laid, exposed on the roadside, to I supply the meeting-house with -water for : over a month, but permission had not , even been sought to lay the pipes. Members said that no whito contractor , could "get away with it," and as far as the meeting-houso itself was concerned, the sanitary arrangements were very crude. It may be mentioned that the Waiapu Council has had such difficulty in the past in collecting Native rates that it intends to convene a conference in Wellington in June or July of representatives of tho counties which have similar problems.