Gentlemen,—I feel the less delicacy in expressing my views upon this subject, inasmuch as both the present Superintendent and Executive are approaching the termination of their official existence, and, therefore, what I have said cannot have any personal bearing. The whole question is one which it will be for the next Council to determine.

I have only further to express my conviction that there can be no extensive departments under our present system of Government, and that, as we have to keep up two distinct sets of offices under the General and Provincial Governments, what we ought to arrive at is not so much reduction of salaries as amalgamation of offices, with which view the practical control of both services ought, to a great extent, to be placed under the Superintendent of the Province—appointed by and responsible to the taxpayer.

Gentlemen,—before parting, perhaps I may be permitted to say a few words upon the question of the constitutional position of the Superintendent—a position which, I fear, is very much misapprehended, both in this Council and throughout the country. I think it right that it should be known that the Superintendent is constitutionally as much an integral part of the Provincial Government as is the Council itself—that his powers are coordinate with those of the Council; and that, although his hands are tied by an anomalous system of responsible Government which was never contemplated by, and is unknown to, the Constitution Act, he is at the same time responsible to the people, and, as the custodian of the public interests, he has deemed it his duty to address the Council on his own behalf, when he has felt that the public interests were at stake.

Gentlemen,—I regret very much that my views as to what is best for the interests of the Province have not met with your concurrence. Under all the circumstances of the case, I feel my position to be a difficult and a delicate one. On the one hand, I have responsible advisers who appear to possess the confidence of the majority of the Provincial Council, by whose advice I am bound to act. On the other hand, as I forewarned you last year, the result of that advice has been to bring the Province to the very verge of a dead-lock. The Provincial Council, as it appears to me, without a due sense of the consequences, determined last year upon a course of action which has virtually deprived the Province of land revenue for upwards of twelve months, the result of which is that it is very questionable whether it may not be necessary to terminate—for a time at least—our subsidies to Road Boards, and all expenditure on the public works throughout the Province. And now, having so far interrupted the receipt of land revenue, apparently equally regardless of consequences, it is proposed to stay the initiation of those public works which alone can remove the stagnation under which the Province labors, and which, if they are not initiated at once, must lead to a state of absolute collapse—placing the Province in the rear instead of in the van of New Zealand.

Personally, I assure you it would be vastly more pleasant for me to be at one with the Provincial Council; but when I see so clearly the results which must inevitably flow from a persistence in the action which the Council have adopted, I feel bound to cast aside all consideration of personal feeling, and to warn both you and the country that the results of that action must be financial embarrassment, and a state of stagnation such as the Province has never yet experienced. As it is, there has been within the last six months a most serious falling off in the revenue from Customs—attributable, I believe, indirectly in no small degree to the stoppage of land sales.

Gentlemen,—believing as I do that there is throughout the country an earnest desire for the immediate commencement of these public works, which, in addition to developing the resources of the Province, will offer abundant employment of labor for years to come and feeling that it will so far mitigate the evils of delay, I propose that the question shall be at once referred to the people themselves, with which view I shall apply for an immediate dissolution—a step which I venture to hope will have your concurrence.

Thanking you for your attendance, I prorogued, and it stands pro—

PROCLAMATION

Setting apart Crown Lands in the Otago Gold Field for the purpose of granting Agricultural Leases.

By his Honor James Macandrew, Esquire, Superintendent of the Province of Otago, in Council.

WHEREAS by the 33rd section of the “Gold Fields Act 1866,” it is enacted amongst other things that it shall be lawful for the Governor to cause Crown Lands situate within a Gold Field to be selected and set apart for the purpose of granting Agricultural Leases thereon and therefor: And whereas Thomas Dick Esquire, then the Superintendent of the Province of Otago, by virtue of and in exercise of the powers delegated to and vested in him in that behalf, did by Proclamation in the Government Gazette of the said Province bearing date the twenty-ninth day of January one thousand eight hundred and sixty-seven, constitute and appoint all the territory therein described including amongst other lands the lands hereinafter described to be a Gold Field under the provisions of the “Gold Fields Act 1866” to be called “Otago Gold Field”: And whereas by the “Gold Fields Act Amendment Act 1867” it is enacted that within any Province in which by any Act or Ordinance it is provided that the Superintendent shall in the administration of the government thereof act by and with the advice and consent of an Executive Council, it shall be lawful for the Governor in Council under his hand and under the Public Seal of the Colony from time to time as occasion may require to delegate to the Executive Government for the time being of such Province subject or not to any restrictions or limitations as he may think fit all or any of such powers vested in the Governor or the Governor in Council by the “Gold Fields Act 1866” as under or by virtue of the one hundred and ninth section of the said Act may be delegated by the Governor in Council and in like manner to revoke any such delegation: And whereas by an Ordinance of the Superintendent and Provincial Council of the Province of Otago entitled the “Executive Council Ordinance 1861” it is provided that the Superintendent of the said Province shall in the administration of the government thereof act by and with the advice and consent of an Executive Council: And whereas the Governor hath with the advice and consent of the Executive Council of New Zealand and in pursuance of the power and authority for that purpose vested in him by the “Gold Fields Act 1866,” and subject to its provisions, delegated unto the Executive Government for the time being of the Province of Otago all powers vested in the Governor or the Governor in Council by the said last mentioned Act as under or by virtue of the one hundred and ninth section of the said last mentioned Act may be delegated by the Governor in Council to have hold and exercise the said powers within the said Province of Otago: And whereas the said lands hereinafter described are Crown Lands subject to be dealt with under the provisions of the said 33rd section of the “Gold Fields Act 1866” and it is deemed expedient to set the same apart for the purpose of granting agricultural leases thereon and therefor.

Now therefore I James Macandrew Esquire Superintendent of the Province of Otago by and with the advice and consent of the Executive Council of the said Province and by virtue and in exercise of the powers