RIVERS BOARD WORK

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVIII, Issue 227, 24 August 1938, Page 7

RIVERS BOARD WORK

MINISTER’S DISSATISFACTION. Per Press Association. HASTINGS, Aug. 23. “The whole rvork has been ‘mucked about.’ If I had had my way the job would have been finished now,” said the Minister of Public AVorks (Hon. R. Semple), when commenting on the Ngaruroro River control scheme today. Mr Semple said that, while he did not want to attack the Hawke’s Bay Rivers Board, ho was not satisfied with the way in which the work had been tackled. Machinery should have been used on the job and the work should have been undertaken in a comprehensive and scientific way. Had he had control of the scheme he would have put machines to work on it, and the work would have been finished by now. At the time of the floods much of it would have been completed, and probably there would have been little or no trouble.

Mr Semple said that at present he had a requisition before him asking for machinery for the job. At the time of the strike of Rivers Board employees he had offered to take the whole work over from the board and carry it out by the Public AVorks Department; the" board had refused to agree to this. Mr Semple said this would be the last job that would be “mucked about” in New Zealand while the had anything to say about it; there was no use fiddling about with “gee-gees and scoops.”