North Auckland Age. WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED “The Mangonui County Times ” and “The Bay of Islands Times.” MONDAY, JUDY 27, 1908. The “Heavy Traffic” By-laws.

Northland Age, Volume IV, Issue 49, 27 July 1908, Page 4

North Auckland Age. WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED “The Mangonui County Times ” and “The Bay of Islands Times.”

MONDAY, JUDY 27, 1908. The “Heavy Traffic” By-laws.

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In our issue of May 4th last, commenting on a conviction under the “ Heavy Traffic ” By-laws of the Mangonui County, we wrote “ but the County and County officials have ever been weak in regard to the enforcement of by-laws which from time to time have been brought into being by vacillating Councillors.” In the article from which we have quoted we indirectly congratulated the Mangonui County Council on having at last evinced sufficient public spiritedness to give effect to By-laws which “ had they been enacted ten years ago, to-day the County toads would have been at least passable during the winter months." It may therefore be imagined that it is with intense regret that we have to record the suspension of the “ Heavy Traffic” By-laws in the Kaitaia, Herekino and Houhora Ridings, and that this temporary cancelment is by resolution of the very same Council which decreed their enactment. On the 26th April last the Mangonui County Council obr tamed a conviction against a bullock driver (G. Thomas, jun.) for breach of County regulations and within three months—when the roads are worse and the conditions more desperate—to wit on the 23rd instant, the same Council suspend these same regulations in over half the County ! We must believe that when, after careful consideration and compliance with the various slow forms required by law, the Mangonui Councillors passed the “ Heavy Traffic ” By-laws which came into force on the Ist January last they felt satisfied that they were acting in the best interests of the ratepayers and in order to better protect our roads. We, therefore, cannot understand why the same Councillors should become convinced, in less than three short hours, of the necessity for suspending these bylaws, Certainly the suspension was carried only on the casting vote of the Chairman, and Messrs. Masters, Pearson and Bray (who voted against) are free from complicity, but does such vacillation redound to the credit of the Council as a whole ?

f It was recognised that hardship , would be inflicted upon the carters , when these regulations became opera- > tive, but no word of protest was , uttered till last Thursday. At the 1 Council meeting on that day Messrs. T. S. Houston, G. R. Evans and Walter Masters, representing the carters of Ahipara, etc,, pointed out the disabilities under which they were placed by the by-laws but—and here is the ' curious feature of this change of front on the part of the Council—all these hardships and handicaps on the carters had been foreseen and discussed when the by-laws were passed by the Council. Why then should any Councillor be swayed by the eloquence of the men upon whom a certain hardship had intentionally, for the good of the community, been put ? Why should the many—the ratepayers and the inhabitants generally —suffer for the few; the carters ? What is it which so persistently recurs, whenever the Mangonui County Council legislate for the good of the ratepayers as a body, to make Councillors stultify themselves and cancel their best thought out and most finely conceived regulations ? Is there no fixity of purpose, no determination to do right for right’s sake ? Or, are Councillors so little what they should be —the leaders of County thought, the fathers of the people, the protectors of the ratepayers—that they shirk responsibility and dare not to think and act for public benefit when they can find some way of creeping away from their own deeds, howsoever good ? The Council have decided to take a poll of the ratepayers of the Houhora, Kaitaia and Herekino Ridings as to the retention of the by-laws. In other words the ratepayers of Houhora and Herekino will be able to out-vote those of Kaitaia on a question of vital importance to the Kaitaia people. In effect the ratepayers of these ridings are to be asked whether traffic on the Awanui-Kaitaia-Ahipara road shall be freed from all control. In other words, whether the County shall retain by-laws specially created for the purpose of protecting a main road which every winter is heavily overtaxed and whereon the most stringent supervision of traffic is imperative if the thoroughfare is ever to become a passable winter road. The Council having found a practicable way to protect the Awanui road now shirk the responsibility of carrying out their own remedy of a recognised evil, and leave to the ratepayers a decision involving a serious question of County finance. It is regrettable—it is more

it is shameful—that Councillors should thus refuse to take upon themselves one of the duties which at their election was delegated to them by the ratepayers. But It is the Mangonui County Council who are doing this and the members are merely living up to their record. Never yet have the Councillors made traffic by-laws which they have had sufficient courage to carry into effect. And this is the very reason Why, when these regulations were under discussion and in course of creation, no protest was made against the drastic nature of these laws. For, said all: —“ Why worry? the Mangonui County Council won’t have sufficient firmness to apply them." We are not now discussing the fairness or justice of the regulations. We are criticising a supine and weak Council who appear to make laws simply to unmake them at the slightest attack. And herein it would be well to note that Cr Masters, the man who should have carried more weight with the Council than any other, the representative of the Riding most affected, strenuously opposed the decision arrived at by Crs. Powell, Thomas and the County Chairman. Moreover it is very curious that these objectionable regulations should be retained to the ultimate good of the southern part of the County when they are suspended greatly against the wishes of the one Councillor representing the district wherein such suspension must do most harm. Again, it is educative to note the way in which the so-called suspension has been managed. Instead of taking the responsibility of the action upon themselves the Council thrust it upon the ratepayers and in such manner that no decision can be arrived at till fhe winter is practically over, and for yet another year the County by-laws have been set at naught. There was only one question before the Council. Either their bylaws were unjust, severe, useless, unnecessary, hard and and unjustifiable or they were sound, honest and necessary for the good of the majority of the ratepayers. The Councillors made those by-laws themselves, and instead of honestly and straightforwardly answering the simple little question they, by their action last Thursday, have told their constituents that they doubt their own work, would like a little information and instruction from the ratepayers and desire to be told how to do the very work which the ratepayers, elected them to do. But, it is once again the Mangonui County Council on “bylaws” and history repeating itself; so that there is no need for astonishment, and had the Councillors behaved with strength and determination, for the good of the public, surely the heavens had fallen.