HARBOUR BOARD ELECTIONS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVIII, Issue 18439, 19 June 1920, Page 9

HARBOUR BOARD ELECTIONS.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —It seems to me that the time has arrived when the various rating bodies that are combined for the purpose of electing representatives to the Harbour Board should make a serious attempt to get tho Act that governs these elections amended so that the various rating districts concerned might be saved a considerable amount of the useless expense they are compelled to incur under the present Act, and would also result in making tho work of the returning officer and his deputies less difficult by reducing the number of rolls at present used in each polling booth by 99_ per cent. A case in point. The Spreydon Borough Council at the recent election had to supply some seventy copies of the electors' roll. This had to be revised and brought up to date with at least a printed new supplement. The revising of these rolls, when so many properties are changing hands, is a fairly big task, and with the necessary printing it is a fairly costly job, which T understand is not l>orne by the Harbour Board but by the local body concerned. This scarcely seems a fair deal. Now there are, I believe, some thirtv-one separate ratine districts in the Paparua, Spreydon. HalsweU, etc., combined area, with something like fiftv polling places. This means that under the present Act (unless one roll is made of the whole area, which extends up to Malvern) oftoh deputy, ra-

turning officer much handle separate borough rolls with their supplements and each of the county rolls with their various ridings, making the work cumbersome, and in the case of a busy booth most difficult to manage. The present Act provides that an elector of the combined area can vote in any part of that combined electorate, "hence the need for each booth being supplied with a copy of each rating district electors' roll. While in some cases this may prove a convenience. I think I should be safe in saying that in many booths 90 per cent of tho rolls have not had half a dozen voters' name marked off, which is evidence that the benefits accruing to a few individuals under the present Act are not commensurate with the cost incurred. If the Act were amended in the direction of making each elector vote in his own district there would be no great hardship to the elector, and it would mean, quoting Spreydon again, that instead of supplying seventy electors' rolls half a dozen would be ample. Probably this. applies also to the other rating districts so that it is easily seen that considerable expense would be saved and the.elections worked much more easily than they aro under the present and cumbersome and expensive method.—l am, 6tC '' JOHN HADFTELD. Spreydon, June 14.