POLITICS AND KEROSENE.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1247, 2 October 1911, Page 5

POLITICS AND KEROSENE.

Sir,—Whenever a candidate for officLappeals to his fellow-citizens for their votes in this or any other country lie seems to consider his case is weak or his mission unfulfilled without throwing a few bricks at tho Standard Oil Company. Usually this is a safe, diversion, for the men engaged in the oil business aro so busy with their work that they haven't 'timo to bother about every stateruont reported that is askew from tho facts. As for explanations, well, our friends do not need them, and our enemies will not believo us. Annvav. out enemies are simpjy our friends who do not understand us. _ However, a little authentic information cannot do any harm to the friends who do or do not understand, particularly when it is about oue of those half-troth* which are infinitely worse than downright falsehood. A man is reported to havb said in public that tho price of kerosene in New Zealand was about lOd. per gallon before the duty was removed; that the prico is practically the samo to-daj, and that the Staudard Oil Company had pocketed the remitted duty. To be exact (see "New Zealand Trades Review" of April 11, 1906), the prico was IOJd., but that price was in bond. The duty-paid prico was 6d. more.. This was'in August, 1900. To-day the retail prico is IOJd f.o.b. Wellington, notwithstanding tho increased cost of carrying on the business-, due to higher wages and expensive buildings, erected at iuaccessiblo places, to comply v-itl> local by-laws nnd regulations, "and the higher cost of every material entering into the produolion of tlio refined kerosene itself, and the packages in which it is contained. Crudo petroleum is often piped 2000 miles in America from the field of production to a refinery at the seaboard. At the refinery it is distilled arid treated bj an elaborate process to get tho finished product, which is tinned and cased most carefully, shipped half-way round tho world, to a place where it is sold for IOJd. per gallon, including the packages which contain it. The people of New Zealand , have gained every farthing by the remission of thb duty on kerosene. The Sd. per gallon has not been syphoned out of the pockets of the people, and they are getting moro value for their money in this article than ever before. Pound for pound, kcroseno oil is one of the cheapest commodities dealt with by tho storekeeper. As there are nearly eight pounds to a gallon of oil; at 10Jd. (less tho second-hand value, of the empty tins and cases) tho cost of the oil is less than ljd. per pound.—l am, etc., C. A. MORSE, Managing Director, Vacuum Oil Company Pty„ Ltd. Wellington, September 29, 1911.