DAVID LEWIS,
For Chief Land Commissioner.

SPEECH OF HIS HONOR THE SUPERINTENDENT OF WELLINGTON,

DELIVERED AT THE OPENING OF THE FIRST SESSION OF
THE SECOND PROVINCIAL COUNCIL,
March 15th, 1858.

Mr. Speaker, and Gentlemen of the Provincial Council—

Called by the suffrages of my fellow settlers to undertake for a second term the duties of the chief Executive Officer of the Province, I have convened you at the earliest period, which a compliance with the requirements of law, and a due regard to the personal convenience of members would permit, for the purpose of laying before you a statement of the present position of the Province—of affording explanations respecting sundry matters that have occurred during the last year, and of enabling you to discharge the high trusts with which, as members of this Council, you have been clothed.

Permit me in the first place to congratulate you that you are no longer liable to be driven from place to place, but that you at length are assembled in a Chamber which will henceforth be especially appropriated to the representatives of the Province, and in a building which will afford ample accommodation both for the Provincial Government and Council, and also for the General Assembly.

The gratification I derive from meeting you in your own Council Chamber is not a little heightened by the conviction I feel that after this Province has, at an outlay which will ultimately be little short of £10,000, so amply redeemed its pledge to provide the requisite buildings for the General Assembly. The House of Representatives will not fail to insist upon their part of the agreement being also carried out. Be this as it may, you will all join in expressing a hope that this building may long be preserved as a monument of the fidelity with which this Province fulfils its engagements.

With respect to the present position of the Province, I undoubtedly meet you under circumstances far more encouraging than those under which I opened the first Session of the first Council. We had then amongst other difficulties to contend against, an empty chest—a revenue which up to that period had been barely sufficient to meet the ordinary expenses of Government—we were called upon to carry on and complete public works undertaken by means of funds provided by the Imperial Government; we had, in order to prosecute the works then commenced and others of still greater importance, to create and establish the public credit so as to enable us to raise loans on fair and reasonable terms; and we had further to renew the stream of labour which had entirely ceased on the suspension of the New Zealand Company’s operations.

Having on a former occasion indicated the scheme of policy by which we proposed to combat these impediments to future progress having on opening each succeeding Session of the Council, explained the success of the measures we had taken, it becomes now my pleasing duty, by a review of the past year, by a brief reference to a few of the chief indications of a country’s progress, to show how completely these difficulties have been overcome; how clear is the path now before you; how ample are the resources now placed at your disposal to more than realize all the expectations ever held out.

It will be remembered that when I made my last financial statement, grave doubts were cast upon its accuracy; apprehensions were expressed that my Estimates of Revenue would prove fallacious, and predictions hazarded as to the serious embarrassments into which the Province would be plunged in case they were adopted and acted upon.

It cannot fail to be gratifying to all parties, but especially to those who indulged in those