CONTROL OF HIGHWAYS

Waipa Post, Volume 38, Issue 2285, 26 March 1929, Page 3

CONTROL OF HIGHWAYS

NATIONALISATION URGED. A proposal to nationalise the main highways was brought before a conference of Farmers’ Union delegates at Hamilton on Friday. Mr Feisst (Cambridge) who moved the remit, considered the construction and maintenance of the main highways should be supported |out of a central fund created by taxing the users of the highways according to use. The speaker also moved that constructional work on main highways should be let by public tender, and that maintenance of main highways should be carried out by a permanent staff under the Main Highways Board. Mr Feisst said it was felt that important permanent works of this description should be, let by public contract and not done by the haphazard methods of the past and at an uneconomic cost.

Mr Henderson said that formerly he strongly advocated nationalisation of the highways. He was not of that opinion now. He paid a tribute to the work of the Highways Board, which was doing what it could to assist the local bodies to put the highways of the country in good condition. He thought the Bloard should be given a proper opportunity to show what it could do. He felt that in a very short time the settlers would be relieved of the bad roads they had had in the past. County Councils were receiving undoubted advantages from the Highways Board, enabling the councils to devote more of their funds to the subsidiary roads.

Mr Feisst pointed out that in order to take advantage of the highways fund County Councils must rate themselves still more than they are already rated. COMMENCEMENT OF NATIONALISATION.

Mr Magner (Te Kowhai) said it was reassuring to hear a member of an important body speaking appraisingly of the work of the Highways Board. The speaker said he would, however, support the remit, and he did not see that it would interfere with the usefulness of the Highways Board. The roads must eventually become nationalised, and the Highways Board was merely the commencement of nationalisation. Mr Henderson believed that if the main roads were nationalised the subsidies for secondary roads would cease and the County Councils would be much worse off.

Mr Hodgson (Te Awamutu) moved an amendment: “That this conference is of opinion that the time is not opportune for the nationalisation of the main highways, and that the construction and maintenance should be carried out under one controlling body, such as the Main Highways Board.”

The mover felt that if the subsidies ceased there would be other methods of getting assistance. He contended that if the conference approved of national railways then it should support the nationalisation of the highways.

Mr J. Bruce said that while local bodies paid 50 per cent of the maintenance of the highways they should maintain q'ontrol. He thought some scheme should be evolved to give local bodies a bigger subsidy for the main roads and that they should get a share of the benzine tax for expenditure on the subsidiary roads. Mr Humphries said h,e would not like to see the local bodies deprived of the control of the highways. The amendment was lost, and the resolutions moved by Mr Feisst were carried.

It was also decided that public works such as construction of railways, roads and bridges should be let by contract to public tender.