CANADA AND CABLES.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 806, 2 May 1910, Page 7

CANADA AND CABLES.

| RATE-GONTROLLINC BILL, COMPANIES' THREAT. • By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright (Rec. May I,' o p.m.) Ottawa, April 30. Mr. George G. Ward, general manager of the Commercial Cable Company—which owns the trans-Atlantic cable from ■ Canso (in Nova Scotia, Canada) to Waterville (Ireland) —has appealed to the Canadian Senate to reject the Government's . Bill placing cable companies and their rates under the control of the Railway Commission.

Several cable companies threaten if the Government press tlie Bill and it becomes law, they'will transfer their terminal stations from Canada to Newfoundland.

PROPOSALS IN THE BILL. The Bill, which was introduced by the Postmaster-General (Mr. Lemieux) and which has passed the Lower House, gives the Railway Commission control of the rates and facilities of the' cable companios. Mr. Lemieux stated in the Dominion House of Commons that the Motherland has promised to enact concurrent legislation. Ho had decided to got from the cablo companies a schedulo of rates satisfying the public and the press. ■ He proposed that urgent messages should remain at one shilling a word, semi-urgent should bo sixpence a word, and the press rate should be threepence. The Ottawa correspondent of "The Times" writes: "The Government Bill respecting ocean cable companies is designed to scure lower rates for both priyate and press messages between Canada and the Motherland. By being made subject to tho jurisdiction of the Railway Commission, as is now the case with tho telegraph and telephone' companies, the cable companies will be required to disclose the full particulars of their business in order to' justify their present charges, which are held to be abnormally high. Another correspondent states': "In addition to the great service the Bill will render to closer imperial relations it will put a stop to the evil system by which at present the larger part of news from' Great Britain . reaches Canada through American channels and with an Ameri- j can bias." •

iMr.Geo. G. Ward, who , asks the Canadian Senate to reject the Bill, was associated with the late Mr. John W. Mackay in organising tho Atlantic and Pacific submarine cables of the Commercial. Cable Co. He was decorated by the Emperor of Germany with the decoration- of the Royal Prussian Crown in 1900 in connection with the laying of, the submarine cable between the United States and Germany.' In 1906 he was also decorated by the Emperor of Japan with tho insignia of Commander of tho Rising Sun on tho completion of the cable between tho United States wnd Japan. , . The Commercial _ Cable Company's, station at Canso, in Nova Scotia, is oonnected by submarine cable with Watervillo (Ireland), New York, and Rockfort (Massachusetts). '