TONS OF ROOFING IRON

Chronicle (Levin), 24 December 1946, Page 7

TONS OF ROOFING IRON

-Press Association

By Telegravh—

NAPIER,. Dec. 22. Thousands of tons of roofing iron stacked high in the assembly stores at Newcastle, Bydney and Port Kembla, and factories turning out. crate after crate of roofing iron sheets, both flat and corrugated, was the picture recently seen by Alr. T. H. Sparkes, British representative of Messrs John Lysaght, Ltd., the largest Australian manufacturers of iron materials. Mr. Sparkes is a passenger on the vessel Australian Star, now at Napier, and is returning to Britain after a visit to Australia. ' ' There is something radically wrong with this situation, " said Mr. Sparkes, when told of the shortage of roofing iron in New Zealand. ''I am ayu'e that if the approach was made, the Australian firms could aupply all the iron ueceaaary to provide at loaat roofs for your houses. There ia no doubt, in my oprnion, that the aupply is there wvaiting to meet the demand. ' ' Mr. Sparkes said that he could not completely uuderstand why there should be such a shortage of roofing iron End allied products m New Zealand when there was apparently plenty of it .lying idlc in the stores in Australia. "Of course, I can't say what has been plauued for those huge stocks of iron whicli 1 saw, but I eertaiuiy saw them, and surely to goodness some could be sent to New Zealand. In fact, I know tliat -if the approach was made and the permission granted for importation a aupply could Ue made avaiiable, " he said. Contrasting conditions in Britain with those in Australia and New Zealand, Mr. Sparkes said that in Britain homes for the people came first. It was appareut in the Cummonwealth and, to a degree, in the Dominion, tliat houses were not ulways having first priority. "When the war ended it was lmpossibie to obtuin building materials for auythiug e.xcept a house. Lai'ge factories whicli were alniost falling down had to remain as they were so that houses could be repaired aud new homes built. That position does not seem to pertain out hcre," said Mr. Sparkes. Mr. Sparkes is taking the opportunity of his stay in New Zealand to explore the prospects for the use of steel seaffolding, whieh has proved of great benefit in Britain 's great rebuilding progranune. The shortage of timber foi st'alfoldixig has resulted in the use of steel, and it had been diseovered that a steel structure could be erected in lialf the time oeeupied in„the erection of scafl'olding with the use of timber.