The Timaru Herald THURSDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1907. LEVELS COUNTY GRANTS.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIC, Issue 13460, 5 December 1907, Page 4

The Timaru Herald THURSDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1907. LEVELS COUNY T GRANTS.

We, are afraid that wo Lave been the unintentional- call so of some injustice being : done to tho chairman of the Levels County Council by the Hon. J. Anstey, who told onw of (nir reporters yesterday that Mr . Orb'eill was " barring,-up the wrong tree" in blaming Mr Flatman and himself i&v the-absence froirt the Public Works Estimates of any pro viisipn for the requirementis of the Levels County. Wo. fancy ithat if anyone wui* to blaino for the introduction of the names of Mr Anstey and Mr Fladnan into the discussion on this, matter, the blame must lest upon our own shoulders. At any rate wo have no recollection of any reference, derogatory or otherwise, to the&e two gentlemen having been mud'a by the County chairman when, at the last meeting of hfo Council, he commented upon the fact that while tho Waimate County had been liberally treated by Parliament in getting everything it asked for, tho Levels on the other hand received not a single vote. We think a leferenoo to the reports of the meeting will show that, Mr OrbeH's strictures stopped there, and that he did not charge wither' Mr Anstey or Mr Flattnau with the - responsibility for -differential treatment to which he referred. But in diawing attention to Mr Orbell's 1 remarks for the purpose of emphasising what, rightly or wrongly, wo legard i» an •entirely incorrect method of financing the construction of pUre'y local conveniences, we drew tho inference that the Levels County had suffered through the unfortunate absence of »Mr Hall-Jones, who, we supposed, would have been as successful in securing grants for 'the local bod'ies in -1 his contslituency as Sir , William Steward' denied to have been wheie the Waimate and' Mackenzie County Councils weio concerned. We added that it was doubly unfortunate for the. Levels that Mr Flatman, who is acting as a sort of locum tenens for Mr Hall-Jontw, should also have been obliged to leave Wellington while the Supplementary Estimates were being dealt with, and Anstey, who is sharing with Mr Flatman the oversight, of matters affecting the Timaru' constituency, should belong to tho Chamber which has no contiol over the colonial purse. We trust, therefore, that Mr Anstey will, recogniso that if he and hio colleague have a legitimate ground for complaint against - anyone for references to themselves in connection with the- absence of grants to the Levels, their grievance is against the " Timaru, Herald," and not against, the chairman of the Levels County Council. At the fcanw) /time,' we should like to assuie both Mr Anfitey and Mr Flatnian that the relnarka in' which wc introduced their'names were not intended in any -nay as a censure upon ! them, but upon,the systent on which allocations aie mad© through the Public Works Estimates and the Supplementary Estimates'. Our iinpra&ion, which is only strengthened ,by tho statement made to our reporter ye&teiday by Mr Anstey, M-as that these grants depend to a largo extent upon the advocacy of district representatives. What other inference could anyone draw from the fact that the counties in Sir William Steward's constituency had everything they' uanted passed on ,ths. Estimates, w.liile the Levels, with the 'member out of, the colony, was ignored in the annual distiibution of public money? Of couiue Mr Ansitay puts a very different complexion on things when he Miye that even the Levels got all it asked for, bub that its mibtake was in a&khig for nothing. We cannot imagine, /however, why ■ & shiewd administrator like Mr Orbell should complain about the way in which his Council had been ignored if no applications* had been seut forward from it for parliamentary giant 1 }, and we must wait for a further statement from him. to elucidate the mystery created! by Mr Anstey's w-sertion. But leaving that point alone, the procedure attending .'the one grant in which the Levels County vn& inteis'sted confirms all we have stuid-about the pi&aujd wilier- has to bs exerted in oidtr to get even the mowb necussaiy vde Uu'oufiV <lf'"''tiw Minister for ~f tib'io

Works wad really acquainted with -.lie relative* merits of the various demand? nriiLi upon him from all parts of. ll.e colony—obviously a task quite beyond the capabilities of the most gifted individual — ttere would be no need to keep prodding him about such an indispensable work as the restoration of the Rangitata bridge-, a structure, by the way. in which the interests of the Levels County must be considerably subordinate to those of th-3 county directly represented by Mr Flatman. Nor do we quite see why in these matters it should be so necessary to success that local bodies should duplicate their applications, seudiug one evt- to the Department and the other to their parliamentary representative or acting - representative as the case may be. Are tlute votes dependent upon the relative value to the colony of the works in aid of which they are given, or are they dependent on log-rolling? Our own idea is that the later element in the allocation of the grants ought to be a negative quantity, but our readers will ba able to judge from Mr Anstey's remarks whether it is