GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS AT WELLINGTON.

Otago Witness, Issue 1581, 4 March 1882, Page 10

GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS AT WELLINGTON.

(from our own correspondent.) ; Wellington. February 28th.

The Department of Justice is abolished from to*night as a separate department. On and aftttf to-morrow all Justice business will be conducted in the Colonial Secretary's office, under Mr G. S. Cooper, Undersecretary for the Colony, as permanent head. When I say " permanent " I only use the term in its official sense, because he will only take charge of the Justice division tentatively at first, until he finds whether he can continue to manage it without detriment to his other duties.' No difficulty is, however, anticipated in this respect, and the arrangement will probably be a lasting one. Mr R. G. Fountain, Under-secre-tary for Justice, retires to-night from office after being 22 years in the Government service. He will reeeiW a full compensation allowance, but not a pension, as, notwithstanding the length of hie service, he has not attained the age at which a pension i could legally be awarded him. lamin a position to say that Government greatly regret to lose his services, as he is admittedly an able and valuable officer, who has worked well and efficiently ; but under the rearrangements there remains little for him to do as a highly-paid chief officer, and I undeistand he prefers retiring on his allowance to taking any subordinate position. Other changes will be made in the personnel of that branch of the Service, although the reductions will of course not be to the extent of £30,000 as reported, which I pointed out at' the time was an obvious exaggeration. I hear that the other departments of the Service will come under review when Ministers reassemble, in order to ascertain whether any further retrenchment is practicable, and some is tolerably certain to be carried out. Just now Mr Dick is regularly " running" the Government, being Governor and Ministry all in one, every one of his colleagues, as well sis the Queen's representative, being absent from the seat of Government. This, however, will not last long. The Premier is now on his way overland, and will come on to Wellington lay the s.s. Rotomahana, arriving here on faunday next. 1 understand that an attempt was made to obtain in Australia a successor to t)r Skae at Inspector of Lunatic Asylums, it being believed that a suitable man could be secured there. This, however, proved not to be the case, and I believe a new inspector will shortly be imported from Home. The property tax is coming in well. The total amount of the first instalment of the property tax received at the various offices throughout the Colony up to last night was £55,000. The penalty of 10 per cent, will be rigidly enforced in regard to all first instalments not paid by to-morrow, when the second instalment becomes due.

As some surprise was created by the telegraphic announcement that 200 of the Armed Constabulary were about to be removed from Opunake to Waikato, I may explain that these Constabulary are to be transferred to Waikato because there is no longer anything for them to do on the West Coast, while m the North much needs doing in the way of opening up the Lake country by roads. It was decided yesterday, therefore, to send up 200 Armed Constabulary, and they will leave Opunake to-morrow evening if the Government steamer can be there in time. It was at first intended to send up the Hinemoa, but it appears her steam-pipes are out of order and would take a week to repair ; so the Stella, which is somewhere up North, has been telegraphed for, and ordered to go at once to Opunake. It is expected that the telegram will catch her tonight at Manukau Heads or Kaipara, and that she will be able to make Opunake to-morrow evening. She will have to make two trips with the Constabulary, as she cannot accommodate more than 100 at one time. They will bo landed at Onehunga, and conveyed thence by' rail, to the Waikato, together with all their tents and camp eauipage. They will then be get to work immediately at the Rotorua road in order to provide a means of access to the Colonial sanitarium, which is already being ■ fited by numbers of visitors,