COUNCIL MAY NOT PAY HONORARIUM.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 46, 24 February 1931, Page 5

COUNCIL MAY NOT PAY HONORARIUM.

PROPOSAL MADE AT RICCARTON MEETING.

The Mayor of Riccarton will, for the next two years, forego his honorarium if the recommendation made at last night’s meeting of the Riccarton Borough Council appeals to the incoming council. Councillor C. G. M’Kellar moved that it be a recommendation to the incoming council that the Mayor’s hoporarium be allowed to lapse for two years. The motion was seconded by Councillor F. S. Wilding. . . Councillor W. Machin, in supporting the motion, said that the Mayor’s seat would be vacant soon, and the recommendation would let the Mayor know where he stood, if it was adopted. The present Mayor, Mr H. S. S. Kyle, M.P., said that he had accepted the honorarium as a matter of broad principle. It was quite easy, he said, to spend the full amount of the honorarium in the first couple of months for “ charity calls ” on the Mayor’s purse were very frequent. Councillor R. G. Malcolmson objected to the proposal. 44 It puts the present occupant in a very awkward position,” he said. “If he retired from the contest this year, he would get the credit of having withdrawn because there was no honorarium. Things had come to a pretty bad pass, he continued, when the council would ask the Mayor to do the work of his office and pay the Mayor’s charities out of his own personal pocket, and the proposal should be made only by a councillor who was prepared to accept the office under such conditions. Councillor Wilding said that the suggestion was made for economy, which was what the country needed at present. Economy was a big nail in the coffin of unemployment. The motion was carried, Councillors Malcolmson and Wise dissenting. Councillor Malcolmson, to Councillor .Wilding: Are you prepared now to go on with your idea that the Mayoralty should “go round ? ” Councillor Wilding: What do you mean? Councillor Machin said the idea was quite a good one. He would like to see Councillors Wilding, Wood, M’Kellar or Malcolmson as Mayor, and would be prepared to head a deputation to the latter gentleman. Councillor T. M. Ford: Don’t I come in at all? Councillor Malcolmson: Councillor Ford is an older member than I am.