THE PREMIER IN PALMERSTON.

Manawatu Times, Volume LXIV, Issue 279, 3 December 1907, Page 5

THE PREMIER IN PALMERSTON.

The Right Hon. the Premier passed through Palmerston by the mail train yesterday en route to Auckland to decide on the new post office site and the new railway station. An expenditure of £160,000 is involved of which, it is expected to get £40,000 back by the sale of the present post office site. Sir Joseph Ward was accompanied by his private secretary, Mr Hislop, Mr Ronayne, General Manager of the Railways, and Mr Campbell, Colonial Architect.

Sir Joseph was met at the station by Mr W. T. Wood, M.H.R., his Worship the Mayor, the President of the Chamber of Commerce, and others. Sir' Joseph in speaking of the Trunk railway (referred to' elsewhere) said that he would be going to Auckland after Christmas to spend a month in the North. Mr Wood thereupon introduced Mr Essex's request that in the way there or back Sir Joseph should open the new water works for Palmerston bringing water from the 8,000 acre watershed granted by the Government, and Sir Joseph replied that he would endeavour to do so provided dates could be arranged. His Worship also thanked Sir Joseph for the river grant and other concessions to Palmerston.

The present visit to Auckland is a flying matter, and work was being oarried on all the way in the reserved carriage, but Sir Joseph said that he meant to spend his holidays on an island placed at his disposal by a friend at Stewart Island, where he would endeavour in sunshine and rest to get rid of the session strain from which he appeared even then to be suffering. He remarked that he had not been in the South Island si tee his return from the Imperial Conference, so closely has he been kept at work in Wellington.