CO129-350 - Public Offices - 1908 — Page 241

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"supervision consistent with the technical responsibility of

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"

"the Consulting Engineers and describes how references are

to be made to them by the Government and by the Resident

Engineer.

Paragraph 19 (c) sets out that the Consulting

Engineers "are responsible for the conception and execution

"of the design in accordance with the intentions of the

"Colonial Government" and deals with estimates and economy.

We think that it is apparent that of these

paragraphs only the opening words of Section C, paragraph 19,

lends any support to His Excellency's views. But we submit

that the words in question refer only to the conception

and design of the whole work and cannot in view of paragraph

6 of the memorandum and of our letter have any other inter-

pretation. We advised fully on the conception and execution

of the design and it is being carried out more or less in

accordance with our general recommendations. For example,

the alignment and levels of the railway and the decision on

the pros and cons of executing the work by Contract and the

estimates of cost were on several occasions the subject of our

reports. But to assume that the words of paragraph 19 (c)

refer to the judgement as to the consistency of clay found-

ations or similar details would be impracticable of execution

6.