WHEREAS certain land vested in the Corporation of the Mayor, Councillors, and Citizens of the City of Auckland and situated at the corner of Wellesley Street West and Bledisloe Street was taken by His Majesty the King under the Public Works Act, 1928, for the purposes of a post-office, and compensation amounting to nine thousand pounds was paid to the Auckland City Council on the tenth day of November, nineteen hundred and thirty-nine, in respect thereof: And whereas the piece of land so taken was part of the land known as the Auckland City Market Site, and was by virtue of section two of the Auckland City Empowering Act, 1913, held by the Council as and for an endowment for the benefit of the inhabitants of the City of Auckland, and not for any special purpose: And whereas by a judgment given on the twenty-fourth day of June, nineteen hundred and forty-one, the Supreme Court at Auckland has determined that these moneys must either be expended in the purchase of other lands to be held as an endowment, or, alternatively, in the purchase of securities to be settled as an endowment: And whereas it is desirable that the Council should be empowered to expend the said moneys in or towards the erection of a municipal administrative block for the City of Auckland: