MUNICIPALITIES AND THE GOVERNMENT.

Southland Times, Issue 16786, 15 July 1911, Page 5

MUNICIPALITIES AND THE GOVERNMENT.

The addition of a system of electric tramways to the municipal enterprises of Invercargill will probably give the Invercargill Council occasion to realise that the State requires to be very closely watched when it exercises its authority over municipal affairs. Yesterday we referred in this place to the anomalies created by the refusal of the State to admit any obligation to comply with municipal by-laws. A municipality may make by-laws to preserve the regularity and appearance of its main streets, to maintain the health and comfort of its citizens, or to preserve certain parts of the town from trades which are deemed noxious or offensive. The Government may defeat the aims of the municipality by setting its by-laws at nought. As has happened in Christchurch, it may erect its buildings without regard to the street lino which the municipality desires to observe. It may establish an objectionable coal depot beside a dairy factory, and having driven the occupiers out may refuse compensation. When Mr Wilford, Mayor of Wellington, as the result of his experience and that of Municipal Councils generally, proposed a new clause in the Municipal Corporations Bill with a view to making the Crown and all tenants of the Crown subject to all by-laws made by a Corporation concerning the erection, maintenance, repair and re-erection of buildings and the drainage and sanitation thereof, and carried the clause despite the opposition of the Government, the Government refused to proceed with the Bijji until Mr Wilford consented to drop his clause. In other words the Government raftised to accept ahy re-

striction on the powers of the State, even at the behest •of Parliament. There is the same conflict between the State and the municipalities in respect to the tramways regulations. Those are regulations made with a view to controlling 'tramway traffic and safeguarding the public, but on the face of them many of the regulations are absurd. The provision, for instance, which requires conductors to carry a stool for use wiiere the steps of a tram car are more than a certain height from the ground has excited the mirth and ridicule of tramway authorities and tramway employees. The idea that a conductor can jump off his car at every stopping place and place a stool on the ground for the convenience of those who wish to leave or board the car, or that people in a hurry would wait for the official and his stool, is patently absurd. Equally absurd is the regulation which requires those waiting for a car to form queues, to take their positions in a string and wait their turn patiently. Again, as Mr Symington pointed out to the Invercargill Council on Thursday night, the proposal to limit the excess of passengers in crush hours to three-quarters of the ordinary carrying capacity of the tram car will prevent the authorities from coping with traffic in the busy hours, except by the employment of additional cars, which will render the tramways unprofitable. Who prepared the regulations is not known, but they look like the work of an official without personal experience in tramway matters, and innocent enough to believe that tramways can be conducted on model lines without regard to pounds, shillings and pence. It is not the ideal but the practicable that has to be considered, and all that the State should do is to prevent abuse and the exposure of the public to danger. Otherwise municipalities and private companies should be left to manage their own affairs. The proposed regulations have caused the municipal bodies of the Dominion who conduct tramway enterprises to protest strongly and even vehemently against the encroachment of the Government on their domain, and they furnish another instance in support of our general contention that while the supreme powers of the State are necessary to its authority, there is a, point at which their exercise becomes arbitrary and even tyrannous. There is likely to be some plain speaking at the Municipal Conference in Wellington, which the Mayor and the Tramways Engineer will attend to represent Invercargill’s opposition to the new regulations.