DUNEDIN NOTES.

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 2660, 19 May 1908, Page 5

DUNEDIN NOTES.

raou ooa ows coaassroNDaNT.

The long outstanding and much debated dispute between Messrs Noyes Bros., the contractor for the Electric Tramways Service and the Waipori Power and Light installation, has ended and ended, much to the surprise of those who knew little about the question, in the success of the Council. The contracters in their final settlement claimed £11,600, and the City offered them £7,700. This was indignantly refused and the Council were called over the coal« by the Press for their attempt to avoid payment of a just and an equitable claim. A section of the Council, I may say, including the late Mayor, was also willing to pay the contractors' demand. Nothing but the firmness and the knowledge of Cr Small kept the Council up the mark. He insisted that they stand by their solicitor's advice and he entered the lists against the 4 Otago Daily Times ' in defence of his action. There was nothing left of ' the Times' contention by the time Mr Small had done with it. Not of course that the paper admitted its blunder. But this did not matter much. The public saw the fallacy of the opposition argument and were somewhat interested to know why the cause of the contractors who had done

well out of their contracts was hotly upheld against that of the city. However, the contractors went to law ; thry filed their claim and their claim was mswered. " Terribly expensive litigation " cried the press, and again the tocsin was sounded and again the waverersin the Council were ready to .stampede. "An audacious piece of bluff" was Cr Small's comment, and to me, privately, he said " I don't believe | they'll ever go on with the case." And Cr Small was right. A few weeks ago Noyes Bros, of their own initiative wrote offering to take £9,500 in full discharge of their claim and once more a section of the Council would have paid it. Wiser arguments prevailed and the amount finally offered by the city (Cr Small still protesting as he knew the strength of the city's case) was £8,501, or £3,100 less than the original demand. This Messrs Noyes Bros, promptly accepted. I have seen no Press comments on the Settlement and no leading article in the " Otago Daily Times.' Yet something should be said. The matter is of interest to ratepayers everywhere. Here we have a demand that half the Council would have paid and all the Council, probably, had Cr Small thrown his influence the other way, a demand that the 'Otago Dail} Times' said ought to be paid and strongly condemned Cr Small for his share in not paying, that after much "bluff" and big talk and engaging of eminent barristers is not pushed to a * conclusion but settled for £3OOO less or £BOO more than the Council first offered. The incident is rich with anxious questioning. Why should a City Council be prepared, as many of its members were, to pay away the ratepayers' money? and why should the Press accept the contractors' arguments rather than those of the clearheaded men in the Council. Is it that every demand on the Council ought under any and every circumstance to be paid ? Politics are beginning to be talked about and the people who honestly believe that politics can make prosperity are getting busy. My own personal opinion—one I am more a believer in than ever—is that we have too many legislators and too many laws. We are a most extravagantly run Dominion and the childlike faith we have in Acts of Parliament is most touching. However, that is neither here nor there. The poiut is what are we going to do? All the old members will stand again and all of them will be opposed. The contest in Dunedin North promises to be exceptionally interesting. There Mr G. M. Thomson, exscience teacher, member of the Otago Institute and elder of Knox Church, proposed to fight the laughing, irresponsible, smart, revolutionary-socialist, Mr A. R. Barclay. No two men could be more unlike. The one staid, heavy, respectable, serious and with no experience or knowledge of politics save what he has learned from the 'Otago Daily Times ' —and other devil-may-care, light, laughing (must I add ' respectable ?') and \up to every parliamentary move. Ot some knowledge, ready of speech, and much perience, he will prove a.hard nut to crack. It is said that Mr G. M. Thomson counts on the Knox Church influence. But it will require something more than the votes of every man and women who attends church and lives in North Dunedin to put Mr Thomson in. Stil! one can never tell, and prophecy is not my strong point.

Mr Downie Stewart, now absent on a trip to America, will possibly oppose Mr Arnold for Dunedin South and possibly will again be beaten. He is young, ambitious, well-to-do and likes work—the sort of man, in fact, that

I want to legislate for uie, but the kind that the Political Labor League do not want. Mr Miller's opponent, if any, is not yet announced. If the Labor party keep their promises they will trot out a candidate. A few months ago they were intensely bitter against him and unless his shillyshallying on the Blackball question has restored him to favor—as it ought—there is no reason to think that Trade Union sentiment has changed. Personally I should very much like to see both Mr Millar and and Mr Arnold looking for a job. What could they do ? The Licensing vote will complicate matters and add bitterness to the fray. Mr Thomson, no connection with " G.M.," adriser-in-chief for the Licensed Victuallers, who last year made a trip to the States and England, is said to be primed with statistics to prove the failure of the prohibition movement in America. These facts and figures he is carefully keeping for the eve of the election when he will fire them off. Naturally the prohibitionists are exceeding wroth at what they term " these shady tactics." In politica-cum-liquor, however, there is neither mercy nor fairness, as Old England is now learning. Anyway, Mr Thomson's statistics—if they exist, and are meant to show the failure of prohibition as a big check on the retail sale of alcoholic drink in the American Stater—are simply not true and not worth the money it will cost to advertise them. The people of America are not all fools and by enormous majoritii ■ in State after State they have swept the traffic out of the country. Mr 'lhouison, therefore, may bring forward sworn statements, police reports and unbiassed testimony to prove that drink may be obtained' in " a dry state "—the lawcan always be broken —but if he goes on to infer that prohibition is a failure and that the people do not want it, then, I teli him quite plainly and without reserve that he will be stating that which is not true. Perhaps he does not mean to say anything of the kind but in case he does it is just as well to let him know beforehand what the temperate, non-abstaining, normal public think. We don't want a repetition of the scandal of three yeats ago when eminent Home divines were made to back up Mr Thomson's party.