GREY MANUSCRIPTS

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 11250, 30 June 1922, Page 7

GREY MANUSCRIPTS

EXCHANGE /BETWEEN NEW ZEALAND AND SOUTH AFRICA. Last year an Act was passed to authorise an exohange of Grey manuscripts between South Africa and New- Zealand. The bulk of the New Zealand material reposes in the Auckland Public Library. The Hon. W. D. Stewart, Minister for Internal Affairs, states that steps have been proceeding under tbq authority of the Act to effect an exohange. A considerable list of material held in the Auckland library has been prepared. It is obvious from this that Now Zealand has a largo quantity of manuscript and other matter which she can very well hand over to South Africa, such material, for instance, as documents relating to South African natives, their habits, and language, and other records connected with tne early history of South Africa, and also a, quantity of matter connected with political happenings in t hat country, documents which are of no direct interest to Now Zealand!, and which have no bearing upon Sir Georgo Grey’s connection with the Dominion. On ilio other hand it is understood that south Africa has much material of a like nature hearing upon New Zealand, which •his Dominion will receive in exchange. 'l'i.e Minister states that it was obvious •n.nlh Africa : s as interested as we are Hm cx-bancc of documents-

PETITION TO PARLIAMENT FROM WANGANTJT HARBOUR, BOARD. WHARF HUMMED IN BY RAILWAY DEPARTMENT. A petition, from the Wanganui Harbour Board praying for the appointment of a Commission, to inquire into its rights to the ownership and use of the foreshore by the Wanganui bridge wharf, was presented to the House of Representatives yesterday by Mr W. A. Veitch, member for tli© district. The petition set forth that in 1872 the Borough of Wanganui agreed to buy bho Wanganui bridge wharf and foreshore from the Wellington Pronvincial Council for the sum of *£20,000. The inoney was borrowed and -paid over, and the Thorough was put in possession of the wharf; but for one reason or another no Crown. o rant of the foreshore had been made to the Wanganui Corporation as agreed. In 1876 the Wanganui Harbour Board was constituted and took over the wharf and the responsibility for the loan. The general Government had since taken over the foreshore and reclaimed it, using it for railway purposes. The Wanganui railway Station was built on part of it, and the Railway Department collected the port duos and wharfage charges made by the Harbour Board, changing it for collecting the same and rooking a further starve for handling the goods exported and imported over the wharf. In 189 S tho board had renewed the wharf at u boat of £7500, and in 1008 it had expended the wharf 500 feet at a further Oust of <£5500. i RAILWAY ENCROACHMENTS. > For some years past, it was stated, jfche Railway Department had used the [reclamation, as a marshalling yard for £bo whole of the iraffic passing from north to south of Wanganui and vice [versa; and for that purpose had laid £ve additional lines of roils, thus seriously encroaching on the part of the rojalamation heretofore available for wharfage facilities. The department had Consequently informed the board that no boom could be found on the reclamation For further wharf accommodation, although it was urgently needed for the Shipping visiting the port, and access to the wharves is seriously curtailed and further extensions of the wharf rendered impracticable The Railway Department had also intimated that in the {course of a few years there would be no SoOm available for the business of the JboTt on the reclamation, and that it Iwould be necessary for the Harbour Board to provide wharves elsewhere, i The petition points out that if the Railway marshalling yards were moved to another site there would still be ample accommodation for the Wanganui passenger and goods traffic for many fears to come, and ample accommodation ior the port for all time, and for further extensions of the wharves down stream as need might arise. But, unless additional ground was thus made available for the use of the wharf, the port would be seriously inconvenienced, 'and means would have to be sought for the construction at enormous expense of entirely hew wharves a considerable distance down stream below the whole of redamatioa and for the dredging and maintenance of a dock there, thus removing the shipping a long way from the" town and involving great inconvenience and expense to the commercial community. The petitioners respectfully urged that the use of the reclamation by the Railway Department should be so restricted as to leave to the Harbour Board an adequate and convenient area for • wharves and extensions for sheds and other facilities as the needs of the port ’require; and they pray that a Commission be set up to inquire into the whole [of the facts which are the subject matter of the petition.