STATE HIGHWAYS.

Pahiatua Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 13641, 27 August 1937, Page 3

STATE HIGHWAYS.

WANTED BY COUNTIES. “While affirming the principle of the Main Highways Board’s action in providing 100 per cent, of the cost of construction and maintenance of the State highways already declared, county councils consider that the Highways Board should lay down the standards of construction and maintenance and leave the control of the work with the local authorities concerned.” A resolution to this effect was passed by the biennial conference of the New Zealand Association at Wellington on Wednesday. The conference expressed the opinion that State control had undoubtedly overlapped local administration, with a. consequent increase in expense and decreased efficiency. Mr J. B. Murdoch (Hawera) said that tlio county councils had the machinery and the men to do the work, and there was no need for o ver lapping. Mr A. E. 'Jull (Waipawa) said that the Highways Board was a. c‘dumping ground” for unemployed, and if the position were not watched, a good deal of the cost of unemployment relief might bo eased off the unemployment fund and placed on the petrol tax, which was the source of the board’s revenue. The president. Mr O. J. Talbot, in his address, referred to the action of the Government in taking over 4000 miles of main arterial highways. “Perhaps some counties might welcome the relief from the financial obligation in connection with improving and maintaining these roads, but there can bo no doubt that in very many cases this policy of centralisation of control has had a disintegrating and disorganising effect,” he said. “It will mean duplication and overlapping in work and organisation in numerous instances, and the financial relief to local ratepayers will be negligible for more reasons than one.”