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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 76

Mileage in Proportion to Population

page 9

Mileage in Proportion to Population

has been distributed.

Including the little scattered bits at Kawakawa, Kaihu and Whangarei, and taking no account of the thirty or forty thousand Maoris who are now large users of the railways,

  • Auckland has 1 mile to every 465½ souls.
  • Wellington, Napier and Taranaki 1 mile to 476.
  • Canterbury and Otago 1 mile to 266½.
  • West land, 1 mile to 11½.
  • Nelson, 1 mile to 1,148.
  • Picton, 1 mile to 684½.

This distribution is certainly not in the interests of the whole colony, and the money expenditure is still more unfair. I fail to see what good can be done to the colony by concentrating so much of the public expenditure south of the Nelson province.

Nor is it in the matter of railway construction only that the distribution is unfair. The same evil exists in railway charges. By means of various expedients known to railway men, certain districts are favoured at the expense of others. Thus, in 1900, Canterbury and Otago obtained in remission of railway charges £57,775, Wellington, Napier and Taranaki between them obtained £11,872, and all that fell to Auckland's share was £2,727. The whole South Island obtained £61,012, and the North Island £15,009. I could give many other examples of how some districts are favoured and others oppressed, but the above will suffice.

The question arises