WANTED INFORMATION.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XV, Issue 5335, 21 December 1878, Page 3

WANTED INFORMATION.

TO THE EDITOR. Srß,—la your report of the Parnell Borough Council it is slated, " Mr. Strange moved for information respecting the payment of the professional surveyor." In doing so, I said it was for the purpose of preventing a dispute when he should demand payment for his services, as I deemed " prevention to be better than cure." It (the motion) evoked a considerable amount of talk. That it was ivit an unnecessary motion, the patent fact that the Council have too many disputed accounts, is not to be denied, the mnro so that they are neither <jredi'a ! >le nor profitable, I will only name one, i.e., the eontr»ct entered into with Mr, J Peach for a portion of the Parnell improvements by the Council, which was made more than fourteen months aijo. it was to have lieen completed in about four month?. Comment is needless : it speaks for itself. sfour l'fiport f IBO states. Mr. Strang moved for a return to be furnished to the Council at the. next fortuighly meeting, of the total amount expended to accomplish the works commonly called the Parnell improvements iu their entirety. Mr. Wood immediately drew a red honing across the motion. Twice I said in tl>o Council that 1 did no l , vaut that the information was ior J. B. Strange—l wanted it ''as the Council's iuformat'ou" to the ratepayers. Mr. Wood then moved the time be one month before it be tabled. Smelling the red herring, I accepted it. Mr. Wood then moved two mouths. I also accepted that; and I further s;.y that, had Mr. Wood moved that the potion be deferred to that day six mauths, 1 would have assented, so strong was the herring. Sir, I ai'l Pow iu the handd of the ratepayers and burgesses', to judge for themselves whether I have done wrong iu seeking to obtain information for them of how, when, where, and at what cost the various works have been done in the borough, seeing they have had no correct statement laid before thein during the period of three and a-half years just past.—l am, &c., I J. B. Strange.