No. 36, Miscellaneous

1. I have the honor to transmit the copy of a correspondence which
has passed between the Government, the Acting Attorney General, and
the Postmaster of this Colony which explains itself.

2. The extraordinary and anomalous condition of the Postal
Establishment of Vancouver Island compels me to trouble you with this
matter, inasmuch as at present there is no legal guarantee for the
safe receipt or transmission of the public correspondence.

3. You will observe that I do not make this reference without having
first adopted the only course open to me for the correction of so
serious an evil.

4. In the course of my inquiry into the working of the various
Departments of this Colony, I arrived at the conclusion that great
mismanagement, inconvenience and loss to the public Revenue resulted
from a bad postal system inefficiently worked.

5. To remedy this state of things I had the Postal Bill of which I
enclose a copy drafted by the Acting Attorney General and introduced
into the Legislative Council which it passed, and was sent in the
usual course to the Legislative Assembly, where it was thrown out
without even the
form of discussion, and I see no reason to anticipate that the
Assembly will take any step to place the Department on a sound or
legal footing till some financial scandal take place such as that
which signalized Mr D'Ewes administration of this important
Department in 1861-2. Indeed it seems unaccountable why steps were
not at that time taken by the Legislature to place it on a sound and
legal footing.

6. You will observe from the letter of Mr Wootton the present
Harbour Master that he is conducting the Postal Department without
any Rules or Regulations, and never received any but verbal
instructions, and that he knows of no authority by which the
different rates of postage are fixed and levied.

*

7. You will also learn from the concluding portion of the Acting
Attorney General's letter (of May 31st 1865) that he is "at a loss
to know by what lawful authority the existing Postal Service" (in
this Colony) "has been established."

8. It thus appears that Mr Wootton the present Acting Postmaster
was appointed in 1861 without written Regulations and without other
than verbal instructions of the Colonial Secretary, the nature of
which in his absence I cannot know, and for the issuing of which there
does not appear to be any legal authority.

9. It further appears that the Acting Postmaster at present is under
no legal control, and that the Governor has no legal warrant for
reforming an ill managed Department by issuing Rules and
Regulations—by fixing rates of postage and having the proceeds duly
accounted for.

**

10. The financial arrangements are in my opinion of a most
unsatisfactory kind, offering great temptations to fraud without any
adequate check or means of detection.

11. I would under ordinary circumstances deem it my duty to apply
some temporary remedy, but it would be hardly convenient to do so,

***

immediately after the Legislative Assembly having refused to
entertain the subject by throwing out a carefully considered Postal
Bill which had passed the other Branch of the Legislature, without
reason assigned, or attempt to amend it.

12. I enclose extracts from two local Newspapers of the 27th May
containing the only information I have received or can offer on the
course adopted by the Legislative Assembly.