NO NOTICE!

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 5, Issue 9, 28 January 1942, Page 5

NO NOTICE!

WHAKATANErTAURANGA SER-

VICE CANCELLED

DRASTIC FURTHER MEASURE

Following the Rural Delivery cut by the Oil Fuel Controller in Wellington comes the further drastic actcion of the total suspension of the Whakatane-Tauranga through service. This new action does away with the service upon which service car passengers have been relying for years and further destroys a living for a man with heavy responsibilities at a moment's notice, making it impossible for alternative arrangements or reasonable steps to wind up.

The communication to the .proprietor of the servi.cc, Mr A. E. Lovell, reads-:— Regret owing to seriousness of the petrol situation, ia:nd the necessity to conserve tyres and motor vehicles mileage, have been reluctantly compelled to cancel petrol for pasenger service Tauranga-Whakatane, as railway service also available. Please arrange service cease as from to-night January 26th. Laurensen, Oil Ftiel Controller. The above actually arrived in Whakatane after the license had been cancelled leaving the proprietor in a predicament which in the meantime seemed beyond explanation. It is aggravated by the fact that no time is given to enable tickets to be cancelled, clients to be notified, or trlade orders to be deleted. The whole machinery of the organisation is expected to be cut off as with a knife.

Most unfortunate is the Controller's apparent ignorance of the rural conditions obtaining here. The service which has been built up does not clash with the rail. It w r as instituted merely to give passengers a through trip to Tauranga, by linking with the Gisborne buses.

Now it will be necessary for passengers to spend a night on the journey, either at Opotiki, Taneatua or Whakatane. Further, the service covers portion of the, R.D.. service m the To Puke area, delivering bread, meat and necessities over a more or less isolated district. There is no hope of notifying the farmers of/ the change, and apparently no possibility of appeal or redress of any kind. ,

While every fair-minded person realises the necessity for conservation of, petrol, they will unanimously condemn the method employed in instance, which demands that a man shall wind up his busi.-i ness at a moment's notice, and at the same time cuts him off from any avenue of appeal or fair hearing. Even in war time this is far from cricket.