SECONDARY HARBOURS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21391, 16 January 1933, Page 8

SECONDARY HARBOURS

Loud protest has been raised in one rural section of the Whangarei Harbour Board's district against the striking of a rate, the first ever sought to be collected. The public can appreciate the feelings of hardpressed farmers over the additional burden, but will be more deeply concerned at the advocacy of default by individuals or the board, especially when this attitude is contrasted with that which prevailed when large loans were sanctioned for purposes of very dubious economic advantage. Default by any harbour board is bound to lead to the question of creating secondary ports being reviewed under national policy. Huge sums have been expended in this direction for very questionable benefit, if any, to the districts concerned. The last official returns showed that the Whangarei Board had a debt of £113,000, that of Thames £63,000, Whakatane £83,000, Tolaga Bay £BB,OOO, Gisborne £927,000, Wairoa £89,000, Napier £541,000, New Plymouth £718,000, Opunake (which has had to ask bondholders to wait for the half-year's interest until next May) £50,000, Patea £94,000, Wanganui £570,000, Nelson £140,000, Timaru £258,000 and Oamaru £147,000. Can it be reasonably argued that all this expenditure has been economically justified or that all the districts have gained any real advantage from the effort to provide them with ports ? There has been wholesale waste around the coasts mainly through misguided local enthusiasm, which, if it has counted the cost, has not calculated the return against it or considered the burden imposed on the property. New factors have appeared in transport since most of the secondary harbour schemes were launched, but even when allowance is made for them, the fact still remains that most of the authorities have plunged into the tide with far too sanguine hopes, and the potential ratepayers have sanctioned loans much too readily. The position of many harbour boards gravely accentuates the financial difficulties of the times, and it is clear that in the future much more effectual checks will have to be applied by the Government upon secondary harbour expenditure.