WHO WILL PAY FOR THAT APOLOGY ?

Hastings Standard, Volume III, Issue 866, 9 March 1899, Page 3

WHO WILL PAY FOR THAT APOLOGY ?

[To tiie editor]

Sir, —I notice in your report of the meeting of the Hastings Fire Brigade that A. A. George has agreed to publish an apology for his dastardly conduct in affixing a card on the Napier fire engine. I should like to know whether it is the intention of that gentleman to pay for publishing this apology out of his own pocket, or whether the ratepayers of the borough, who subsidise the Brigade, are to pay the piper.—l am, etc., Ratepayer.

[To The Editor.]

Sib,—Some months ago I drew attention, through the columns of your valuable journal, to the fact that a duly audited balance-sheet of the Fire Brigade's accountshad not beenpresented "to the Borough Council for several years, and urged that such remissness was a reproach both upon the Council and the Brigade. You fubbed off my demand for a stringent audit with an an editorial footnote to the effect that the balance-sheet was in the hands of the auditor,_ and the matter dropped from public interest until your report of the Brigade s meeting on Tuesday night showed the urgent necessity for enquiry and reform. The admission made by the Secretary as to the manner in which the Brigade's business is conducted fairly makes one shudder. The fact that a single cheque is drawn to cover a number of accounts ; that this cheque is impounded by the Secretary, who substitutes various cheques of his own, or his private business contras ; and, worse than all, that these accounts remain unpaid for months after the Brigade's cheque for the payment of them has been cashed, constitutes an irregularity to which the law books give a very ugly name. After his admissions at Tuesday's meeting, the Secretary should be promptly relieved of his duties, and the auditors should search out, not merely whether the Brigade's funds have ultimately reached their appointed destination, but into what devious by-paths, if any, they have strayed in the interval between the cashing of the various cheques and the settlement of the_ accounts, and of what duration that interval has been in each case. Thanking you in anticipation.—l am etc., Searchlight.