SELECTED ARTICLES.

Colonist, Volume VIII, Issue 770, 10 March 1865, Page 3

SELECTED ARTICLES.

ou;a new burdens.—the cost of the

PANAMA MAIL CONTRACT.

{From The Colonist, February 28.)

Ws may expect some obloquy, deserved obloquy too, to fall on the shoulders of New Zealand for being compelled to resort to additional taxes on our imports; taxes which will more or less tend to restrict our home trade, and give to the people of England ground for displeasure. They will naturally say "We have aided, and are aiding, by men and money, this pet colony of New Zealand, and as a return they place heavier duties on our exportable commodities. "

The worst of the thing is that while these new taxes are being levied, our heterogeneous Ministry has just concluded a contract to pay £110,000 a year for the Panama Mail Route. Theyarediscouraginghomeimporters and taxing the colonists to raise money under pretext of meeting war' expenses, with the one hand, and, with the other, they are spending £200,000 on those expensive toys the Electric Telegraph and the Panama Mail Contract. This latter bargain, is as we learn, a distinct breach of faith on the part of the Ministry with the Houses of Legislature, and is another instance of the utter unfitness of the Weld Ministry to conduct the business of the colony. It was clearly understood in the Assembly that the Panama Contract was at an end. Yet, we believe, that although nominally the monopoly clause for the inter-colonial mail services, is struck out of the new contract entered into by the Ministry on the one part, and Captain "Vine Hall as representing the Panama Company on the other ; the terms are such as make the contract far better for the Company, and far worse for the Colony than even that unwarranted arrangement of Mr. Crosbie Ward's, to which the Houses of Assembly, the Ministry of the day, and the colonists at large were so strongly opposed. This is an undoubted fact, and when we witness such imbecility in a Ministry about whom such a preliminary flourish of trumpets was made, we are constrained to ask, —Where shall we find political leaders in New Zealand ?