BACK TO TOLL GATES

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 17522, 21 March 1931, Page 6

BACK TO TOLL GATES

MAKING ROAD USERS PAY FARMERS’ UNION SUGGESTION The reversion to the toll gate system of making the users of the roads pay was suggested by a member of the Poverty Bay executive of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union at to-day’s meeting. The president, Air. F. S. Bowen, in urging that the union should persist in its efforts for the derating of farm lauds, pointed out that whereas last year 7 per cent, of the Cook County rates remained unpaid at the end of the year, there were yet 23 per cent, of the current rates unpaid. He said lie could see a danger of automobile associations dominating the policy of the Highways Board, and if the farmers did not insist on other methods, 1 the farmers would soon I e rated off their lands. The benzine tax to date was still not sufficient, and it would not have been enough even if the Government bad not withdrawn its subsidy to the Highways Board. He was quite sure that the farming community would obtain relief in the derating of farm lands ii' they insisted on it. Ho moved that the executive, support the Matainata County Council’s proposals placed before this week’s meeting of the t ook County Council. Air. M. T. Trafford said the system was now coming back to the old one of toll gates, when the users of the road, including the farmers themselves, would pay for the roads according to the use tliev made of them. The discussion lapsed without any motion being passed.