Local and General

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 2, Issue 247, 9 December 1940, Page 4

Local and General

Meeting at the Paper Mills. An informal meeting of shareholders in the Whakatane Paper Mills will be .held at the Mills today, commencing at 11.30 a.m. The annual meeting will be held in Sydney later this monlff. Emergency Precautions. Attention is drawn to the advertisement inviting enrolments in the Emergency Precautions Scheme and the Women's War Auxiliary, Enrolment forms are obtainable from committees at Manawahe,. Matata, Edgecumbe, Taneatua, Waimana. Ruatoki, Galatea and at the Borough and County Offices. After all, What is £2000? At the meeting of the Whakatane Chamber of Commerce on Thursday evening Mr Reeve Canning pointed out that there would be a considerable dilference between the prices of the two sites mentioned" for the new post office and the Department might object to paying thousands of pounds just to procure a site thought desirable by the Whakatane businessmen. The president, Mr W. Sullivan, said there was no doubt tliat the site favoured by {he meeting would cost more but in a total expenditure of £25,000 or £30,000, £2000 was nothing. It was the situation that counted. -

The Unofficial Guide. "It is surprising tlie number of visitors to the town who ask to be directed to the Post Office—and nine out of ten ask me. I find that I have to. draw a plan, saying, 'Don't go over there; don't go down Quay Street, but bear slightly to the right and follow the street.', I would like to be able to just, stand and point."—Mr W. Winn, speaking on the new site at the Chamber of Commerce meeting. Careless Talking. Astonishment at the freedom with which New Zealanders discuss troop movements and other defence matters which the authorities consider should be kept secre-t, was expressed in Auckland by a New Zealand merchant navy officer who has spent much of this war on the coast of Britain and has two had of his ships torpedoed. In Britain, he said, even a request for information about the light street to take for a certain* destination would now result in an instruction to apply to the nearest police station for direction, the reason being , tlia.t routes from place to place in the country were regarded as being of use to an invading enemy. However, in Auckland he had found that nothing even if it might mean the safety of hundreds of soldiers, was so secret that it should not be discussed in shops and on the streets.

Waioeka Telephone. It is understood that the Main Highways Board lias agreed to complete the telephone connection, in the Waioeka Valley. This decision follows representations made to facilitate information of value to motorists passing from one end of the valley to the other. Farmers' 1 Meeting. A general meeting of shareholders in and suppliers to the New Zealand Cooperative Pig .Marketing Association wili be held in the Presbyterian Hall, Edgecumbe,' on Wednesday. Mr W. A. Phillips, chairman of directors, will address the meeting, which commences at 8 p.m. An invitation is extended to all interested. Edgecumbe Dance. With proceeds going to the local Farewell Committee's funds, a particularly worthy object when it is remembered that there have been many calls on the fund and there will be many more in the future, a dance will be held in the Edgecumbe Hall on Wednesday night. Popular, prices obtain and a ffee bus will leave the 'Rock at 7.45 p.m.

Butter Box Shortage. According !o evidence placed be-' fore No. 6a Manpower Committee in Palmerston North, the dairy industry is faced With a definite short age of butter boxes and cheese crates and unless the shortage can be overcome, the Government's greater production effort was likely to be seriously affected. The labour problem was mainly responsible. Army Canteen. Charges. An anomaly which appears to demand investigation is reported- by a member of the First Echelon who states that cigarettes sold from the New Zealand Army canteens in Egypt are costing exactly double the charge for the same cigarettes at the Australian canteens. In view of the assurances given that' the New Zealand canteens would not be run for profit, this statement appears to demand attention. Effect of Restrictions. V The effect of the restrictions on the use of petrol on road traffic may be gauged from a comparison of particulars of quantities released from bond during the first nine months of 1939 and 1940, remarks the latest number of the "Abstract of Statistics," the amount for 1940 being 17.7 per cent less than that for 1939. At the end' of September last there were 278,359 motor vehicles licensed, compared with 285.586 at the end of September, l93Sh Private cars licensed numbered 196,229. compared with 203,543. "Feweir Nuisances." "I want you returned soldiers to support the Home Guard to the utmost. I don't want you to" look down on its members because most of them were not at the front during the last war," said Major-'Gen-, eral Sir Andrew Russell, InspectorGeneral of Military Forces in New Zealand, when he addressed the 4th Battalion of the National Military Reserve in Gliristchurch. "The more there are in the Home Guard,'* he added, "the fewer there will be to get arounud and make nuisances of themselves. Even the women can help in this direction." A Difference of Opinion.'

That Ministers of the Crown could differ in opinion was illustrated by Mr B. S. Barry when speaking on the new post office site at tlie Chamber of Commerce meeting on Thursday night. Mr Barry said that when the . former Postmaster-General, the Hon., F. Jones, had visited Whakatane, he had stated, definitely that the new building would be erected on the present site. Other sites would not be considered. The present Postmaster-General, the Hem, P. C„ Webb, had indicated that whatever site was chosen for the new office, it would certainly not be that occupied by the present post office. • "Lads of the New Army." Ever since the war began the interests of "the lads of tlie new army" had been watched by the New Zealand Returned Soldiers' Association, said the Dominion president (the Hon W. Perry, M.L.C.) at the annual reunion of the Wellington branch of the South African War Veterans' Association. .They had been keeping at the authorities, said Mr-Perry,, and they hoped that when • the boys of that new ( Army returned they would take an* interest in the association and . in time dominate it and take charge,' "while the South' African veterans and other old boys like ourselves fade away." 1