THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. FRIDAY, MAY 16. 1903. A CREATER AUCKLAND.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XL, Issue 12271, 15 May 1903, Page 4

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. FRIDAY, MAY 16. 1903. A CREATER AUCKLAND.

The important questions referred to by the Hon. E. Mifcchelson in his> Mayoral address bring the city and

its suburbs face to face with the necessity for a Greater Auckland. For it is manifestly impossible to solve permanently either the water or the drainage problem upon a narrower basis, or even to attend adequately to the public parks without the cooperation of surrounding local authorities. The streets of Auckland City merge Into the streets of neighbouring boroughs and road boards without break of continuity. The Fire Brigade cannot be completely organised upon present parochial limitations. The abattoir question is in reality a Greater Auckland question. The very public library i® as much of interest to the Aucklander who resides in Parnell or in Grey Lynn as to the Aucklander who

[resides within the municipality. ' Whichever -way we turn, amid the varied functions" of municipal activity we are confront e"d by the fact that'the town has outgrown Hs local government organisation and that a readjustment of boundaries a:id "reassimilation of interests is urgently called for by the eyery-day routine of civic life as well as by the growing pressure for great sanitary works. Mr. Morton, chairman of the Onetree Hill Road Board, has taken up the cudgels on behalf of a Greater Onehunga. Every statement which he makes, every argument which he advances, on behalf of closer and more effective unity of action by local bodies on the southward side of the isthmus can be made and advanced' with tenfold force for the union of the nebulous authorities which now control Auckland town.

Without going into any hypothetical., dissertation upon the ultimate nclnsion 'within one great city government of a ten-mile radius or of he whole of the area lying between Waitemata and Manukau, Tamaki mcl Whau, with the .associated subirbs on the North Shore, it is clearly i- topic of immediate and practical politics that Auckland City and the idjoining boroughs and road boards should coalesce. No casual visitor xom any great modern city tvoulc loubt that such incorporation was ictually in operation. It would be unintelligible-' to him that, as he iassed along our streets and roads vhere every indication points to in separable interests and common lo :al conditions, he was travelling :rdm one local government to another and viewed a jumble of locally uitonomous districts whose energies ,vere largely wasted in isolated action. His natural criticisms upor :he inconsistency of our methods, as shown by the incomplete charactei )f much of our civic work, would laci :he explanatory key to the situation —that we have no true Auckland jiyic government, but- have got intc he habit of worrying along as best »ve can under a system utterly inadequate to our present requirements. Apart from the more outlying districts which are rapidly becoming populous suburbs, the city md the boroughs, with the Kemuera, he Epsom and the Mount Eden road ooard areas, already overlap one another and should be one in local government as they are in unity ol local interests and in identity oj Dopulation'." If .'a shorter step were thought advisable, the city and the ooroughs are surely ripe for amalgamation. Parnell. Newmarket and jrrey Lynn are urban, not- suburban, Ireas. Their political union with Auckland City is so obviously desirible that it can encounter no reasonibie opposition in the minds of their peoples, arid such a movement would orobably set up a- centripetal motion vhich might be confidently expected io break up the'inertia that delays :he* advent of a more extensive Greater Auckland and to draw the adjoining road boards into the city organisation. Mr. Morton advocates a Greater Onehunga as a prelude to the union that will some day stretch from water to water. Ij proof were needed of the growing mity of the isthmus it is to be found n his inclusion of Epsom as a Manufan constituent, while we as naturally regard it as linked with the civic ortunes of the' Waitemata bodies, [t does not matter very much where ihe movement begins or the initial 'orm which it takes, for when once started it cannot avoid following nore or less closely the lines traced lot by theorists, but by the growth md development of our population. The inadequacy of the present Auckland method has been singularly demonstrated by the crumbling of the defence which it was sought to Bet up for the ward system. Thai source of so much bad administration and financial waste had all the nherent strength of an established institution. But it has been made very clear that it will be swept away oy the first determined attack, and she probabilities are that when we lave "the battle of the wards" we shall have no battle at all. Such lessons as that taught by the return of Mr. Mitchelson to the Mayoral chair are not lost upon •he politician element watching foi signs of the times. And as the wards nust go as a step to sounder government and more economical administration, so the local bodies must go. The great body of our citizens are lot disposed to disturb old institutions unnecessarily, but neither are mey disposed to allow necessary re:orms to be blocked or their welfare ;o be disregarded. That a parochial spirit has grown up under the fosterng influence of our parochial methids is unfortunately true to a certain extent. But it has no strong 'ooting among the people as a whole md is more superficial among those ,vho have devoted themselves u parochial politics than would appeal it first sight. The other leading cities of the colony are being moved in the " Greater" direction, and Auckland cannot remain a lonely example of how-not-to-clo-it. Ever were we disposed to linger along ir the present unsatisfactory and extravagant manner under our chaotic and disconnected local bodies we cannot possibly do so if great civic work is to be accomplished. The sooner we have a Greater Auckland the better it will be for all concerned. Apart from the greatei economy of administration and the concertedness of local government work we shall thereby become possessed of a sufficiently powerful loca' authority to deal effectively with problems which affect every resident within its area.