The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1842-10-07 00:00:00

FRIDAY MORNING, OCTOBER 7, 1842.

The length to which our reports of the Town
Council meeting, and the meetings of St. Peter's and
Castle-street Wards, have run, will prevent our re-
marking at any length upon the proceedings of the
former body. Upon one subject, however, we feel
impelled to offer a few remarks, which must of neces-
sity, however, be very brief.

We fancy we can perceive, onlthe part of a section
of the Council, a disposition to convert the recent
calamity which has befallen the town into an occasion
for the revival of what has been termed " the ware-
house question." That restless gentleman, Mr. Alder-
man Evans, would fain be at work. His fingers itch
for patronage tho oppointmont of inspectorships and
sub-inspectorships, warehousemen and porters, floats
before his vision ; and in imagination he is already, as

chairman of the warehouse committee, invested, in
something between the character of a turnkey and a
monarch, with the absolute control of the great bulk
of the property of the port, and the power to lock and
unlock, discharge, and arrange, the goods of other
men at his own magnificent pleasure. The committee
just appointed to enquire into the state of the ware-
house property of the port, with a view to the preven-
tion of fire, must, the wily alderman suggests, take
into their consideration the question of the " location"
of such property—must, in fact, if they would put
themselves under his guidance, convert themselves
into a committee to devise a new scheme for the erec-
tion of warehouses upon the dock quays.
We might have passed over without notice Mr.
Evans's attempt to revive his favourite hobby; but we
cannot so easily pass over the inclination. displayed by
other gentlemen " to get up and ride" with him.
Amongst others, we see that Mr. George Hall Lawrence
has expressed his opinion—a new one, we believe—
that the warehouses of the town '6 must in future be
built round the docks," and directly intimated that the
trustees must be at once, by an act of parliament,
invested with their control.

Mr. Lawrence assumes that, in such a location they
would, independent of the alleged advantages of cen-
tralization of management, be less subject to the dan-
ger of fire ; but is this the case we ask ? Is it so very
certain that the quays of the docks are the most safe
sites for the erection of warehouses ? Some people,
quite as well qualified to form a judgment as either
Mr. Alderman Evans or his convert Mr. Lawrence,
maintain, that by such a location not only will the
warehouses be more unsafe, but that the shipping it-
self in the docks so surrounded will be endangered.
A reference to our report of the dock proceedings will
chew that serious doubts are felt upon this subject.
The insurance companies of London have declared
that they will not insure property in the warehouses
at present building by the dock estate. They are at
this moment rejecting insurances in St. Katharine's
Dock Warehouses ; and they have recently raised the
insurance upon the shipping in that dock from 2s. 6d.
to 7s. We rather imagine that, with these facts be-
fore him, Mr. Lawrence will be induced to reconsider
his opinion.

We have no means of ascertaining how many of the
gentlemen appointed upon the committee entertain
the sentiments of Mr. Lawrence with respect to this
question of warehouses round the docks ; but from the
circumstance that Mr. Evans himself is one of them,
and the reputation of that gentleman as an excellent
persuader, we fear most strongly that their labours
will not result in effecting the object for which, in
reality, and not to advance Mr. Evans's projects, they
were appointed by the Council.

We publish to-day a document which we are con-
fident will excite the amazement of the world. We
refer to the First Report of the Special Committee
appointed by the Council to enquire into the duties
and salaries of the servants of the Corporation.
Peruse it carefully, reader ; ponder over the facts
which it discloses ; and you will rise from the task,
able, perhaps for the first time in your life, to explain
the meaning of the expression " Municipal Reform !"
You are a plain man, perhaps ; you have read Walker's
dictionary, or Johnson's, and imagine that " reform"
and improvement are synonymous. You never were
more mistaken. Whig lips may have prated in your
ears of the "scandalous, rotten, corrupt old Corporation
of Liverpool," and boasted of the Consummate Purity,
the Excellent Management, the Rigid Economy of the
new—the " Reformed Corporation." You have now
before you the materials for arriving at a correct idea
of their truth. If the old system was bad, this you
will say is rotten through all its veins. If Toryism of
old offended,—if jobs occasionally soiled its hands,—
if sinecurism and favouritism werepractised,—modern
Whiggery, at any rate, has far outdone it in offensive-

We shall not for the present offer a word of com-
ment upon the reportitself, for which we and this
community owe a heavy debt of gratitude to Mr.
Lloyd, the originator of the committee, and to the
gentlemen who were its members. They have per.
formed, thug far, their duty fearlessly and well. Let