BURDEN OF RATES.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 265, 8 October 1940, Page 7

BURDEN OF RATES.

EXEMPTED LANDS. A KAIRANGA PROTEST. Government land in the Massey College area is exempt from the payment of general and hospital rates, and as a result the loss of these rates has to be made up by ratepayers of the Eitzherbert riding of the Kairanga County Council. This was described as an unjust burden at a meeting of the council to-day, when the subject was discussed after correspondence had been received about the transfer of further land in the riding to the Grasslands Division of the Department of Agriculture. The council decided that as from next year the loss of the rates will be taken from the riding alone and spread over the whole county! Cr T. D. Lynch said it was his duty to protect the interests of the ratepayers. The rate payments on Massey College were falling on the Fitzlierbert riding, and it was an unjust burden. He advocated that steps be taken to bring about some adjustment in the position. Cr. J. Batchelar said there should be an amalgamation of ridings so that the expenditure would be spread over the whole county.

Cr F. J. Russell was of the opinion that even then the position would be unjust ; the. Mangaone riding, too, was paying the rates. Cr Lynch said that what the Mangaone riding had done was appreciated. That riding would not lose a penny by consolidation. As the council could not agree about the matter, lie suggested that it should go to the Government to see what the latter had to say. The Government had never been told that one riding was carrying the burden. The clerk (Mr N. I. Nielsen) said that ho contended that the payment .of the rates was a national matter.

Cr D. Collis agreed with this. Everybody in New Zealand received benefit from the college, lie said, and the Government should be asked to pay the rates which the county lost. (T M. AY. Voss skid that it was a very old question. The Fitzlierbert riding, however, should have admitted that the Mangaone and Taouui ridings had assisted it when they did not have to do so, probably to the extent of Fitzherbert’s loss.

The Government should be approached and asked for a specific grant, said Cr Lynch. The clerk read the details of a resolution passed by the council in 1937, asking for a grant from the Consolidated Fund to meet the position. The final reply was that, the exemption on the col lego land arose not because it was Crown land, but because it was used for an incorporated university or college. Thus the college was in the same position as secondary schools. Cr Voss suggested that the council agree to share the loss and spread it over the whole county. He moved that, on the assumption that the step was legal, the whole council should share the proportion of the loss sustained by the Fitzlierbert riding on the Massey College and Grassland Divisions land, as-from April, 1941. Cr N. P. Nielsen said that to wait ou the G oVCl ’nment in connection with the matter would be futile. The fair thing would be to spread the loss over the county; and it would be even fairer to spread it over the whole of the North Island. The motion was carried.

Cr Batchelar expressed the appreciation of the Fitzlierbert ratepayers’ in the attitude of the council in endeavouring to assist them.