LOCAL BODY LOANS.

Taranaki Daily News, 15 September 1924, Page 6

LOCAL BODY LOANS.

PROTEST AT RESTRICTION. ATTITUDE OF ELTHAM COUNTY. (From Our Own Reporter.) •Eltham, Sept. 18. “I can’t go to Stratford and allow my eyes to rest on. the hrjge new post office there without experiencing a desire to blow it up,” said Or. A. McWilliam at a meeting of the Eltham County Council last Saturday during a discussion upon the report published in the Daily Ne'ws setting forth the opinion expressed in the Legislative Council that local bodies in New Zealand were raising too many loans. Continuing, Mr. (MeWilliam, who lives at Omona, said for the past twenty years, on coming out of his gate, he had to plough through a stretch of mud. He felt he was surely entitled to some metal when a loan was available. The chairman (Mr. C. J. Belcher) said the position as outlined in the Legislative Council might apply to borough councils, but certainly did not apply to county councils. Other councillors expressed similar opinions, and remarked that county councils, far from having the raising of loans made easy, experienced considerable difficulty in getting special loans sanctioned.

It was decided, on the motion of Cr. McWilliam, seconded by Or. Carter, '“That this council protests against the threatened restriction of necessary borrowing on the pa<t ot county councils under the allegation that the public ibedies of the Dominion are over-bor-ro'wing to the detriment on the money market of the farmers of the country That while it is obvious that considerable extravagance in borrowing has been practised by the cities and boroughs of the Dominion, this council desires to state emphatically that it (has been exceptionally moderate in its loan proposals, and that these have been for the metalling of mud roads and the erection of bridges which are absolutely necessary in the intereats of the country’s production, and that for these purposes its powers to borrow should not be further restricted. That this resolution be forwarded to the Prime Minister.”

Cr. Knuokey referred to the extravagant waste of public money in the construction of a bridge by the Stratford borough so wide that it could never be made full use of for the next thirty or forty years. Cr. Campbell: “Loans for the development of the country are absolutely necessary. What is the use of having a farm if one can’t get to it?”