THE OTAGO CENTRAL RAILWAY.

Otago Witness, Issue 1855, 10 June 1887, Page 12

THE OTAGO CENTRAL RAILWAY.

(Feom Our Own Cobbespondent.)

As a good deal of interest is taken throughout a large portion of Otago in the construction ef the Otago Central railway, a resume of the points made by Obago members on the second reading of Mr Pyke's Otago Central Railway Extension Bill will prove interesting.

Mr Pyke, who had charge of the bill, in his remarks dealt more particularly with the history of the line,' contending that, the remainder of the line from Taieri Lake to Lake Hawea could be made in two years if the House sanctioned the bill, without any cost to the colony and without appealing to the Home market for money. He concluded by saying it is a work which will benefit the colony, will benefit every interest in the colony, and every class of the community. All the industrial interests will be benefited — the artificer, the mechanic, the handicraftsman, the trader, the producer, all will benefit. Those manufacturing in the towns will have a better market ; those who produce grain and wool and everything that can be grown upon land will have more easy access to the consumers. In every way this work will benefit New Zealand, and I believe solemnly in my heart that it will contribute very largely to the dispersion of that gloomy cloud of depression which has so long hung like a pall over the energies aDd enterprise of New Zealand. Scobie Mackenzie, in the course of his remarks, said : I am, I^wish to point out, in a peculiarly impartial position to speak upon this bill, for, although my property is in the neighbourhood of where the line would pass, I am, as many honourable members know, not a landholder but a leaseholder. I have simply a run ; and the construction of this line, as honourable members will know, is destruction of the leasehold — no owner of a leasehold can possibly look for any advantage whatever. This line has been under construction as a Government work since 1868— about eight years, and there has been £315,000 or £320,000 expended. Let me, therefore, impress upon the House that the construction of this work would really help considerably the finances of the colony. This may be termed a bill to facilitate the cessation of borrowing. Honourable gentlemen know just as well as 1 do that, when once a line is taken up and is carried on for a considerable portion of the way, the people living in the district will never let the line die ; and this is not likely to be a line that the people will give up in a hurry. There always will be agitations ot some sort about it, and the Government will find that they will have to spend at any rate a portion of what money they have in hand upon it. By this bill we simply relieve the Government of the onus and the expense. Let me point out that this is not a new proposal ; it is not a new line. It proposes to construct by means of land grants a railway that the Government of this colony, since 1878, undertook to construct at the expense of the general public. If we can construct it by means of land grants it will be a great assistance to the whole colony, and it will get a very awkward question out of- the road. About the merits of the line itself I propose to deal simply with a few hard facts. First of all, it is necessary to note that the whole of the land through which this line passes, from beginning to end, is Crown land ; and throughout the whole of it there are little groups of settlers scattered here and there, and these settlers have been induced to settle upon this land, as tho Minister of Lands well knows, by virtue of the fact that this line had been taken up by the Government many years ago, when it was stated that it would be pushed on as fast as possible. The selectors have therefore settled upon the faith of that promise ; and, as the Government scheme has virtually broken down, it will be a gross breach of faith if we do not carry on the line in some such way as is indicated in this bill. Tnen, this bill proposes very greatly to hasten the same class of settlement that is going on now, the same which it is the desire — I am sure the very honest desire— =of the Minister of Lands to facilitate. The honourable member for the Dunstan read out subsection (8) of the bill, which provides that the land ,so granted to the company shall be leased or otherwise disposed of in accordance with the land laws in force for the time being in the colony— that is, by deferred payment, agricultural lease, and perpetual lease ; and, in fact, by all other means which the land la.vs of the colony provide for. It is small settlement that will be facilitated by the disposal of the land. If this provision is retained in the bill and carried out, no settler can obtain more than 640 acres on perpetual lease, or 320 acres on deferred payment or by absolute purchase. I which now to state to the House that when we speak in Otago of the vast tract of Crown land which this railway will open up we say that a considerable portion of it is poor land. I believe that a block of 500,000 acres would comprise the whole of the rich agricultural land in that district. But I must draw the attention of the House to what we term poor lacd in Otago. Every acre of this land is rich wool-producing country, and there is not one solitary waste acre from the beginning to tho end of it. Ido not think lam far from the truth in saying that, generally speaking, any considerable block of the worst land on the Otago Central line is equal to the very best block of the same size on the Midland line. I am thoroughly acquainted with the laud,' aud know the condition of the settlers and the bitter way in which they complain of the breach of faith with them as regards this railway. If this line can be constructed, as I say it can, without going to the London market to borrow, and if the land we propose to give for it must be used for the purpose of promoting settlement, aud on small settlement conditions, then I say we could not possibly devote our land to a better purpose. If it were possible under this bill to let the land go in large blocks to large holders I would

oppose it, I objected on that score last year when my honourable friend mentioned the bill to me. The bill did not then contain the clause providing that the land was to be sold according to the land laws of the colony — by the same methods, for the same price, and in the, same quantities. It did not contain that clause, and I could not see my way to support it. When that clause was introduced all my objections were removed. I think the bill is one that is capable of being amended in committee, and it does not follow that we are to construct the line the whole of the way to Lake Wanaka. The House will have it in its' power to say whether it is desirable to construct the Hue to any given pomt — it can make the terminus where its likes. I think it is a good bill, containing a thoroughly good, sound proposal, and I shall very heartily give it my support.

Sir R. Stout said : I believe, from what I have seen of the country and what I know of a portioH of it, that the land is suitable for small-farm settlement in many parts, and that it is, except the land extending from Catlin's river on towards Waikawa, really the only Crown land left in the provincial district of Otago — I exclude part of Southland — suitable for small-farm settlement, I may say almost in the South Island. Now, what is this proposal ? This proposal is that a railway shall be constructed through this land, and that it be constructed by a public company, the Crown giving over 33 J per cent, of the cost in land to this company as a bonus for constructing this line. However anxious I might be to see such a line constructed, I hope this House will never consent to this bill. There is no provision for settlement ; and I do not think a private company is a fit medium for providing for settlement upon this kind of land. So strongly do I feel on this subject that, however anxious I might be to see the railway constructed, I believe it is better for Otago, and for the colony, to say it shall not be contracted for 20 years than to give the land away as it is here proposed. The most difficult part of the railway has been made. The railway is now to the gorge of the Taieri river ; within a year or two it will be on the level land beginning on the Strath-Taieri level, and from there extending to Poolburn Gorge. There are no engineering difficulties of any account at all until you get to Lake Wanaka. There will be a difficulty at the Poolburn Gorge. But practically the line will be running on level land — I might say almost as level as this floor. There are no engineering difficulties once you get out of the gorge of the Taieri river. Now, this line was commenced a number of years ago— in 1879— and I admit it has been proceeded with very sjowly since that date. But we must remember that the colony cannot push on all its public works to completion all at once. I apprehend that those that come after us, 30 or 40 years hence, will have public works to perform, and will have perhaps greater lines of railway to construct than we have. We are only a small people, and we cannot expect to get all the railways we wish at once. We must go slowly, and as far as our means will allow; and if our means are small and we cannot borrow much just now this line, like all others, must wait for completion till we have funds. Then there is another view of the matter. By the construction of this railway -we should hand over a very large part of the pastoral estate of the colony to a syndicate ; our receipts from pastoral rents are at once largely diminished, and we must increase the taxation of the colony straight away by, I believe. £30,000 or £40,000 a year.

Mr Fergus said : "If the Premier had not been the very one to alienate the very largest amount of the public estate ever alienated at once, and that to a foreign company, I should heartily have supported him in opposing the alienation of land for the construction of the Otago Central. But what did he do ? Why, he did this — and he is now contradicting himself, as he has done ever since he has been in political life, going directly opposite on one motion to the oourse he took on the preceding one. If it is a fact that a private railway conpany does not want to induce settlement, then, I say the Premier has done a grievous wrong to the colony of New Zealand by handing over to a private company two and a half millions acres of land for the making of the Midland railway. Then, the Premier says the Obago Central railway is being constructed. What did the Premier and his political friends do ? Why they made the fact that the Otago Central was being constructed at a snail's pace a cudus belli at the last election, and they preached it throughout every constituency that the proceeding Ministry was doing next to nothing to push on the construction of that railway. And what have these honourable gentlemen been doing since? Why, they have out-heroded Herod, and I make bold to say they Lave done infinitely less in pushing on that railway in the period they have been in office than their predecessors ever did before. I am entirely at one with the Premier when he says that in the district through which this railway will run is the greater portion of the agricultural land yet remaining to be settled in the colony. But the sooner the Premier brings that land into occupation the better ; and, instead of handing it over to a company, meaning a loss of £30,600 a year to the colony, the colony will be a large gainer, for the whole of the increase of value given to the land by the railway will remain in the country. It may be the means of getting the line made by people in the oolony, and its increased /alue will not go away as interest on foreign capital at all, and the gain to the colony will be sufficient to not only wine out the loss of £30,000 a year in lessened punii'rrl rents, but the revenue of the colony from that district will be trebled by the opening up of the land by the extension of the railway thereto. I say that the line is worth making, and I have a greater authority than the Premier, a much greater authority than the Premier, a man of infinitely greater and deeper insight, of more general knowledge, and one whose word will carry more weight in the councils of the colony than the Premier's. I have the authority of the Surveyor-general of the colony for saying that there is half a million of acres.of arable land <5n the route of the Otago Central railway fit for settlement and ready for the plough now.

Mr Pyke, in his reply, said : The Premier should be the very first to aid and assist me in this undertaking. What is the use of his saying, "We must wait ; if it is 30 years, we must wait ?'• Perhaps the honourable gentleman has 30 years to wait ; I have not. He is a young man aud has many opportunities, I am an old man and have few, and I must do the best I can before I descend into the appointed home for all of us. A similar sentiment fell from the Minister of Lands. He said we must " consider." Why, that is the tune the old cow died of. I daresay the House is acquainted with the story ; if not I will give it to them : — There was an old man who had an old cow and he had no grass to give her, So he took out his fiddle and played her a time, " Consider, old cow. consider ; TLis isn't the time for the grass to grow ; consider, good cow, consider." And that is the tune tb,e old cow died of, and that is the tune that is, being played to us ; we

are to consider, and. to wait till later, and so on. Have we not considered and waited?" j first brought this before the House, in 1878— that is 11 years ago— but what hare I got up to the present time. . We have had eight miles completed, and it has taken eight years to do it If the railway is to continue for the other 180 miles at that rate it will take 180 years before it is completed. I cannot wait that time, and yet I am perfectly sure, speaking with all revetence, that I shall see that line finished before I descend into the grave, in spite of all opposition and of all Governments. I was asked just now to state what has been spent on the line. The total amount of money voted up to and in. eluding 1885-86 was £751,400. How much was spent out of that? £261,214; aud out of that £100,000 > was for the unemployed making a hospital, and-nothing better, for them. — for the dilapidated, the lame, and the lazy. There is £500,000 standing to the credit of the line at the 'present timevoted, and not spent. And I could show, if I "had time, that that money was taken and spent on roads and railways elsewhere. Here is the return for the year 1883-4; £120,000 was voted by the House, and there was expended £11,830; in 1884-85, £165,000 voted, and the expenditure was £29,352: in 1885-86—1 am coming now into the honourable gentleman's own time— there was voted £126,000, and the expenditure was £75,879. This is a better record, I admit at once, and I do not charge the present Government for a moment for Having neglected this work. I said before that they have done a great deal more to precipitate this work than was done by any previous Government ; for five years it was left in statu quo ; but that does not help my question one whit. I nover opposed the railway, but simply the manner in which it was proposed to make it. With regard to the cost of the line, all that I ask for the company is 250,000 acres of tussock land ; and what is it worth now? It is to be taken in alternate blocks, and it is agreed that it shall be at a price fixed by law— that is £l an acre — and therefore it is £250,000 worth of land that is asked for. It is to be taken in alternate blocks of a specified depth ; and it is certain tint every acre of Government land will be benefited, that its value will be doubledand therefore it is absolutely certain that not a farthing shall be lost to the Government by the grant. Every acre of land we take will render another acre of public land worth twice as much. I trust to the good sense of the House to carry the second reading of the bill, The bill was read a second time.