REFORMING THE HARBOUR BOARD. Mr. Fisher Lifts the Contract.

Free Lance, Volume II, Issue 97, 10 May 1902, Page 8

REFORMING THE HARBOUR BOARD. Mr. Fisher Lifts the Contract.

MR. GEORGE FISHER had a crowded meeting in the Exchange Hall last week, and carried his audience entirely with him in the case he made out against the Harbour Board. He strongly condemned its favourite mode of doing important business in committee. He advanced some cogent arguments for making the Board a more truly represen ative body than it is. And he attacked its extravagance, denouncing as unprecedented and unjustifiable the recent raising of Mr. Ferguson's salary from £1,000 to £1,750. We ha\e alre4dy expressed strong disappixnal of the sudden and apparently cut and dried manner in which this affair was rushed through committee and ratified by the Board without a word of warning to the public. Even Mr. Fisher, although a member of the Board, was not apprised beforehand of this particular busine-s. George was also very emphatic in his opinion that the position of engineer to the Wellington Harbour Board is not worth £1,750 per annum. He pointed out that during Mr. Ferguson's round-the-world trip last year — which, he says, cost the Board £], 500 — Mr. Smith carried on the duties 'very capably, and no one seemed a bit the worse. " The sun rose e\ery morning while Mr. Ferguson was away," said George, with grave deliberation, " and so did the tide. The rivers ran to the sea just as usual, and flounders were caught at the mouth of the Wai wet u, and all the work of the absent official was done by Mr. Smith. If Mr. Smith could not do it, I have sufficient confidence in the remaining population of the whole world to believe we could find one other man to carry on the engineering work of the Wellington Harbour Board." So far George Fisher. At present Mr. Ferguson is off to Australia on another trip — this time to inspect dredges for the Board, which intends to buy or build one. As Mr. Ferguson only returned in October last from his round-the-world inspection trip which cost the £1,500, it does seem odd that a dredge-inspecting trip to Australia should be requisite only six months later. That merely by the A\ay, however. * * • What is wanted is a reform in the constitution of the Harbour Board. At present it partakes too much of the nature of a close corporation. It needs reconstruction on a more representathe basis. Mr. Fisher has made public his intention to introduce a Bill next session to alter and enlarge its constitution. His scheme does not

altogether commend itself to us. We think the nominated element should be abolished. Let the Harbour Board have a wide constituency, but let it be thoroughly representative of and in immediate contact with that constituency. It should be just as amenable to public opinion as Parliament is. The present constitution is effete and played out.