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Marlborough Express, Volume XIII, Issue 1010, 23 March 1878, Page 5

We consider it (a matter for regret that the members of the County Council do not appear to see the desirability of bringing the Act into operation in Maryborough, for thefsake ofjthe district, as the Government desire to expend all votes for Public Works through the medium of the local bodies. Among these, as we have joointed out before, there is £1500 for the new road from Nelson by the Rai Valley, and £5000 for the Clarence Bridge! If the district will not avail itself of those votes, which will soon lapse,, it is of littlo use our Member, troubling ' himself to obtain them. The following ■ appropriate remarks are taken from the Grey River Argus: — "He must observe that whilst it was the intention of the Act to hand over all the important local functions to the Counties, and to subsidise thone bodies out of the Colonial revenues to enable them to perform them, the disposition on the part of the new local governing bodies has been to shirk every difficult work, or question, and shove ' it on to the shoulders of the General Government. Thus it is with regard to main roads -and bridges, the maintenance of hospitals, and in other respects, the new arrangements have not worked sctisfactory. The Counties have not the means or the disposition to undertake onerous ressibilities, and the ignorance ..which seems, to pervade '■ every department of the General Government at Wellington produces an amount of confusion and dissatisfaction that is deplorable to witness. And again, whilst it wSb hoped that the abolition of the Provinces and the creation of Counties would i relieve the Legislation of a great deal of work and shorten its sittings, the very contrary has been the result. The time of Parliament is taken up with questions of a bridge here and a road there, and otherwise of a local character, which lack of knowledge makes the House the least qualified to decide, and the sittings have become so protracted as to compel the retirement of many of the most useful members aud to discourage others who are qualified to take their place. No doubtjall these drawbacks, incidental to the initiation of all hastily-contrived political inatitutiohs, will be remedied in time, but the question is in what direction the remedy should be applied ? "