COUNTY AND ROAD BOARD SUBSIDIES.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XX, Issue 3909, 8 May 1877, Page 4

COUNTY AND ROAD BOARD SUBSIDIES.

oir, — i iiear irom a friend who lias recently been travelling in Canterbury that the road boards there are rolling in wealth. In addition to the road board subsidies proper, they get the county subsidies too. The counties have " hung up" the Act, and the arrangement is that as soon as they get the Government grants they shall hand them over to the road boards, in the same proportions as the road board subsidies. When it was seen that a county council like that of Selwyn had decided on hanging up the Act, we might have been pretty sure that it was the best thing for us to do also, and that " John the Shrewd " would bo found not to be far out in the advice he gave us. It is no wonder the Canterbury members supported the Government last session. The legislation looks as if it had been framed for the special purpose of robbing the sparsely-peopled districts of the North Island for their benefit. As you have pointed out, Selwyn, in the neighborhood of Christclmrch, the richest county district in New Zealand, gets twice as much subsidy, in proportion to its rates, as Wairoa does. What has become, then, of the boasted policy of fostering the outlying districts and opening up the country i The outlying districts were twice as well off under the provincial system. — I am., tfce. , A Provincialist.