176
arrive in England before the end of the year and I shall be greatly obliged if Your Lordship's approval of the Estimates of Expenditure may be intimated by telegraph as soon as
possible.
4.
The details of expenditure are dealt with very fully in my address and in the explanatory notes which appear as Appendix II to the Estimates and it appears un- -necessary to recapitulate those explanations in this des- -patch. It will be observed that there is a fairly large number of new minor appointments, scattered through various Departments. These appointments are necessitated by the normal growth of the Colony and I do not think that I need refer specifically to any of them except to those in the Public Works Department in which Department it is proposed to appoint en additional Second Grade Executive Engineer, 2 Second Grade Assistant Engineers, eight Draughtsmen of various grades and some other minor officers.
I am satisfied that an increase to the staff of the Public Works Department is already overdue and my only doubt is whether the additions now proposed will be sufficient. You will observe that in my address to the Council I foreshadowed further increases if, as I hope, the financial position of the Colony should justify us later on in adding to the already very large list of Public Works. The Colony is developing very rapidly and it is necessary to keep pace with its development by a steady course of improvement of roads and communications generally and by the provision of additional buildings. The conditions of the last five years made it necessary greatly to curtail work of this nature with the result that there is a large amount of arrears to be made up and unless there should be some serious set-back to the prosperity of the Colony, there will be ample scope for may
years
Er $58.5"