PRINTING AND SOFT DRINKS

Grey River Argus, 11 May 1911, Page 3

PRINTING AND SOFT DRINKS

(W. C. Times, May 10th. Do not think that we are ffoing weyond the mark .when we state that the matter of the contract for the District Electors' 1101 l and the printing- of that Toll with rank as one of the hugest .scandals and pieces of joDoery which has come under the notice of our people in recent years. We agree to. tke letter wtfh what oui contemporary said in its, issue on Monday evening", but we would go much turcher. The point emphasised by our contemporary was what it states as a fact viz., 1 that the Robinsons, whoever they are, secured the contract, did not execute vie work themselves but sent it out of town. If reason to believe mbfw mfwvcbmmm that is a fact, and hve have no teason in the world to doubt it, then the sooner our townspeople take up the cudgels against s.uch prarMces the better. Here we would romaik that the Council which let the contract showed a great laxness in the performance of their duty in the matter. There are two well-known and capable printing concerns in the town — their business is printing, but as Councillor Thomas Robinson would say, they earn their crust by thai means. The Council knew well that these two concerns do their own printing because they are printers. Yet they get a quotation from a firm of Ginger- B er Manufacturers, and because it is a few pence lower per page than the price ask dby printers they let out the contract Without making the slightest enquiry whether -these Uinger-Jtseer people can execute thfc woric or not. Had they made this enquiry they wo"uid have found \vhe~ tiier the work was to be done here or not. But they made no such enquiry; indeed it is quite clear that there has been hanky panky work all through, and seeing that the work went out of the district, it is quite plain that the Robinsons were not the only people who made something out ot the deal. Further, what hs the explanation of what seems ot be a tact vjz., that the Town Clerk informed one of the other tenderers that they could not get the roll for printing until the 12th of April, and yei "the Aerated-Water-Printing firm got it from the Town Clerk on the iUJi. Why should this favour have been extended by the Town Clerk to his cordial pals? Another point: — seeing that the successful tenderer evidently could not and would not execute the work in Hokitika, but was simply a .go-between. (We understand that Councillor Thomas Robin son is the agent in Hokitika for Whitcomb and Tombs), it (was the duty of the Council to advertise for tenders so that Grocexs, Bootmakers, Bushwhackers and Sundowners, might have had an equal chance for com* pefmg- with Aerated- Water Manufacturers. The fact that the Robinsons have some kind <jf printing machine or other is quite beside the question. They might just as well have a sew-' dng machine as a mangle if the work was to go out of the district. We repeat that the Council w(suld have been just as justified in accepting a tender from Bob Cairns or Billy Portus as from the 'Robinsons because in either case the work was to be farmed QUtL,