LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume V, Issue 1298, 13 January 1868, Page 3

LOCAL SELF-GOVERNMENT.

We take the following from a Wellington paper, the Post :—" A strong Central Government for a group of colonies like those of JNew Zealand is an impossibility. It can never be strong; but we have evidence sufficient to warrant us in asserting that it may be costly. On the other hand there is no country so well adapted by nature and to the habits, tastes and genius of its inhabitants, for institutions of local self-government, as is New Zealand. To the *.nglo-Saxon ear tho very term " local selfgovernment" is as sweet ns the music of the spheres; but the physical character of this country, without reference to the character of its inhabitants, would necessitate the creation of local institutions of self-government were there nothing of the kind already in existence. ±he county of Westland, for tHDi pie, could not be efficiently governed from Wellington. It requires a local government of its own. This is admitted by both Centralists and Provincislists. But it not only requires a local government of its own, but that government itselfrcquires to be clothed with as extensive powers as those confeired by the Constitution Act on the Provincial Councils. Whatever the General Government agent may be called, he his to all intents and purposes the Superintendent of the country ; only instead of being elected by the inhabitants to preside over their affairs, he is appointed to the officeby the Ministry for the time being. If he administers the government beneficially and satisfactory, it will be seen he carries out the wishes of the County Council, and disregards the instructions of the General Government, when the wishes of one and the instructions of the other happen to clash. If he should not do this a dead lock ensues, and anarchy is the necessary consequence. The difference between the county system of the Stafford ministry and the Provincial system established by the Constitution Act is to render sixty instead of six Provincial Governments necessary, while it would prevent the people from having that direct control which they have now over their own affairs. If the above view of the subject be the correct one, then it follows that instead of Provincialism.

being, as it has teen falsely represented, antagonistic to local self-government, it is really the complete development of it. It is local government in its fullest and most perfect form. In a country like New Zealand the vestries of parishes in England, or the small toivnship governments of America, could net be satisfactorily carried cut if the Provincial Governments were abolished, unless some more complex, costly, and unworkable machinery were established in their stead. Even now the Ecad Boards, School Committees, and other local bodies finditneces- , sary to frequently refer matters which are to them of the utmost moment to the Government of the Province in which they are constituted, which causes all kinds of delay, and most serious inconvenience. How much more -would this be the case were there no Provincial Governments to refer to, but only a distant Central Government, which would have too much on its hands to attend willingly, or to attend at all, to their wishes or requirements ? Suppose each town or district had, as it ought to have, the exclusive management of its own local affairs, would still bo matter of common interest to them all, which it would be impossible for any one of them, as it would be for a distant central authority, to deal with satisfactorily. In such, cases the Provincial Government, through the Superintendent and the Provincial Council, would constitute a popular court of appeal, to which such matters could be referred, and equitably adjusted. It has been the custom to look upon the Provincial Governments as costly pieces of machinery, which in their day had their uses, but which could now be very well dispensed with. But if the Provincial system, was abolished to-morrow, an equally costly, but a much less popularly constituted, system would have to be established in its stead; while the central administration, unchecked by public opinion, and having its powers fearfully augmented, would be able to buy off opposition in the General Assembly, by the extensive patronage they would have at their disposal, and by the taxes they would then be able to squeeze from an oppressed and impoverished people.