MELBOURNE AND NEW ZEALAND

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 305, 20 September 1919, Page 7

MELBOURNE AND NEW ZEALAND

VICTORIAN PORT COMPLAINS OF ISOLATION By TolcsraDh-Prcjs Association-OopjTlght Melbourne, September 19. The "Age," in a special article dealing with the diversion of trade from. Melbourne io other ports, especially trade with New Zealand, gays it is a fact that, local manufacturers and distributors have lost ground, particularly in the case of New Zealand, because Melbourne has been cut oft from direct communication with .the Dominion. Nearly all the available steamers now run between Sydney and New Zealand ports. , ~ The "Ago" points out; that the shipping companies do not run, -steamere from Melbourne to Sydney merely to give the crows a change of scene. Tho trips must havo been made worth their whilo, and the secret was that they had discovered business men at Sydney at the expense of those in Melbourne. The position regarding cargo awaiting shipment to New Zealand was very serious. Forty thousand pounds' worth of tea alone purchased by New Zealand business houses was held up, with ni» immediate possilfility of shipment. Two steamers leave Melbourne for NewZealand in the next few weeks, but their space is quite inadequate to meet requirements. The attitude of the shipping companies is that it does not pay to run combined passenger steamers between Melbourne and New Zealand, because there are insufficient passengers offering, while cargo steamers are . mostly diyorted to the coal trade to meet the Dominion's acnte industrial and domestic situation. —Press Assn.