NEW ZEALAND

GOVERNMENT GAZETTE.

PROVINCE OF CANTERBURY.

Published by Authority.

All Public Notifications which appear in this Gazette, with any Official Signatures,
are to be considered as Official Communications made to those persons to whom they may relate,
and are to be obeyed accordingly.

By His Honor’s Command,

WILLIAM ROLLESTON,
Provincial Secretary.

VOL. XII.] WEDNESDAY, MAY 31, 1865. [No. XXX.]

ADDRESS OF HIS HONOR THE SUPERINTENDENT

On Opening the Provincial Council,
Tuesday, May 30, 1865.

Mr. Speaker and Gentlemen of the Provincial Council—

When I last prorogued this Council I intended to
call you together for the purpose of the ordinary
annual session before the expiration of the present
financial year. The meeting of the General Assembly,
which it was then anticipated would have been held
early in the present year, has however not yet taken
place, and the measures which may be expected to be
proposed to that body in reference to the financial
position of Provincial Governments throughout the
colony, and to other matters seriously affecting this
province, are yet unsettled. As your proceedings with
regard to these important questions must depend to
a great extent on the action of the General Assembly
during the forthcoming session, I have thought it
expedient to defer your ordinary meeting until that
session shall have been held. I trust you will agree
in that decision.

The business to be now submitted to you will
therefore be confined to asking for authority for the
expenditure necessary to carry on the public service of
the province during a limited period after the expiration of the present financial year, and to one or
two other questions of pressing importance.

Among the latter I would especially mention the
subject of railway communication. It is with
much satisfaction I have to inform you that
I have concluded a contract with Messrs. G.
Holmes and Co. for the construction of a railway
from Christchurch to the north bank of the Rakaia

river. The recent financial depression in the colony
generally, and the difficulty which, owing to various
circumstances, has been experienced in negotiating
provincial debentures in the London market, have
rendered some delay in the commencement of this
important work unavoidable; and have also made it
expedient to introduce some special provisions for
which your sanction will be asked with regard to the
payments to be made to the contractors.

I trust that the stimulus which will be afforded to
the prosperity of the province by the undertaking of
so important a means of developing its resources, and
the greater favor with which the debentures of this
province appear to be now regarded in the English
market, will enable me to take steps at an early date
for carrying out the contemplated line of railway
communication to the northern part of the province.

Since your last meeting a valuable and extensive
goldfield has been discovered on the West Coast,
and a large mining population is now congregated in
that part of the province. In anticipation of this
event I had made preliminary arrangements, which
enabled me as soon as the importance of the discovery was ascertained, to take the steps required by
the emergency for the maintenance of order and a
proper regulation of mining pursuits, as well as for
providing improved means of communication between
those districts and the eastern portion of the province.

I commissioned the Provincial Secretary to proceed
to Hokitika with authority to organise the machinery
for the government of the goldfields, and with
instructions to furnish me with detailed and authentic
information as to their condition and requirements.

In pursuance of the information thus obtained I
have thought it desirable to appoint a Commissioner
for the Goldfields, who acts as the representative of
the Provincial Government, and has the general control.

Vol. 12.—No. 30.