WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, 28 December 1923, Page 8

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

RULE OF THE FOOTPATH KEEP TO THE LEFT. (From Our Own Correspondent.) On the 15th the new by-law of the Wellington City Council requiring people to keep to the left on the city footpaths will come into force. How long Wellington has . been discussing this matter in its customary apathetic fashion it would be difficult to say. In the earlier days of settlement “keep to the left” was the universal rule, both on the road and on the footpath, but in the early nineties some, municipal busybody returned from the United States with the story that the**Americans “kept to the right,” and succeeded in persuading the local authorities it was the proper thing to do, so far as the footpath, was concerned. Then followed years of confusion, arising out of one rule existing for the road and another for the footpath, and an inevitable increase in accidents. Now Wellington, having discussed the matter in a desultory fashion for two or three years, is going back to the old rule. A large force of police will be employed to-morrow to see. as the authorities put it, that the ne'w by--1 lew is observed from the -first, and that the stream of traffic is kept moving. There is to be no trifling with the municipal edict. DAIRY CONTROL. The promoters of the measure made such a fuss over the Dairy Produce. Export Control Bill while it remained sus--1 pended between heaven and earth in ■ Parliament that it was expected when i the farmers had an opportunity to pm the finishing touches to the legislation they would exercise their privilege to the fullest possible extent. But, strange to say once the Act was on the Statute Book their enthusiasm for its beneficent provisions began to wane. First of all they had to say whether the Act should come into effective operation or whether ir should remain among the State archives merely as a monument to their exhausted energy. Barely two-fifths of the people entitled to vote troubled to save it from oblivion. Yesterday the poll for nine. members of the Board to administer the measure closed, and it was found that out of 53,000 odd persons entitled to vote fewer than 20.000 had returned postal ballot papers, unless i some of the envelopes contain more than I one paper. It seems, therefore, that after all the campaigning on one side i and the other by interested people a majority of the dairy farmers do not j think the whole business worth the j stroke of a pen.

WHAT IT MEANS. The Evening Post takes the apathy of the dairy farmers in this matter very seriously. “The success or failure of the Act,” it said on the eve of the closing or the poll, “depends upon the B.oari cf Control, and especially upon the ni.i.j men the producers themselves shall elect. Much h said to-day of the monetary value of the dairying industry. . Into the liatids of a hoard of twelve men, of whom nine shall be dir ectly farmers' representatives, then, will be committed the disposal of this enormous material wealth, the product of the farmers. But how are the farmers taking it? The poll for the nine members of the Board of Control closes tomorrow, yet up to the present only about one-third of the producers have voted. Such indifference on so great a matter is really deplorable. This is th? kind of thing that opens the way for any amount of trouble due to tactlessness or worse, offering an inducement to the talkative to shoulder aside the practical in the management pot only of dairy farmers' affairs but of public business in general." It certainly is disappointing that so large a number of the people immediately concerned have displayed so little interest in this momentous experiment.

THE RAILWAYS. The railway returns tor the first seven months of the financial year, published this morning, show a substantial :m--provement upon the figures for the corresponding period of last year; but the critics still insist that the best possible results are not yet being obtained from the lines and that radical changes in the methods of management arc required. Their general contention is that the railways are being largely used to exploit the settlers in the older producing districts, and not at all to assist the pioneers in the baekblocks. The foundation for this indictment is found in the high charges maintained on the paying lines, and the reduction or discontinuance of services on the non-paying lines. Il is complained that the idea of making the State railways a stimulant to settlement has been abandoned altogether, and that they now are run as might be the most sordid of private enterprises. This, of course, is scarcely fair. At best the railways are not paying 1 per cent, upon the accumulated cost of their construction, and their ehargen do not compare unfavourably with those imposed on the Australian lines. What is wanted more than anything else is the consistent development of a sound business policy.