COSTLY BRIDGE TRACK.

New Zealand Herald, Volume L, Issue 15377, 12 August 1913, Page 8

COSTLY BRIDGE TRACK.

MINISTER'S CAUTIOUS . ATTITUDE. [BY TELECEATH SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT.] Wellington, Monday. To a deputation which came to him this afternoon asking for something like £I6OO or £2OOO for the construction of a bridle track from Belltown (Nelson Province) to Mount Radiant, a distance of six or six miles and a-half, the Minister for Public Works (Hon. W. Fraser) replied that the request for such a sum for such a purpose was quite an impossible one to grant this year. The track, it was stated, would connect Karamea with Tadmor, and would give access to settlement country apart altogether from the metallurgical (particularly copper) possibilities of Mount Radiant. The Minister declared the Government was not going into any speculative business. The people concerned might be satisfied that they had a second Mount Morgan there, but the Departmental report was not so roseate. The deputation pressing its claims, the Minister decl3Jod that while he wished to help them they must satisfy him that there would be some chance of a return for the large outlay. Eventually the Minister decided to meet the deputation again to-morrow evening, when he would have consulted the Departmental officers.