UNDER MANY FLAGS

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 151, 22 March 1939, Page 6

UNDER MANY FLAGS

Dispatching- New Zealand Mails Pending the completion of Empire mail communication entirely by air from New Zealand to England, the Post Office utilizes every possible opportunity for dispatching mails across the Tasman by steamer to connect with the airmails leaving Sydney three times weekly. In February, mails for the Empire service were sent across the Tasman in 17 vessels. They included American, French and Dutch steamers, two British: tourist cruise liners, five British cargo steamers and the usual intercolonial and Pacific liners. The Post Office has a statutory right to take advantage of facilities for oversells mail transport provided by any vessel leaving New Zealand, the Post Office Act providing that the Customs clearance (without which vessels cannot leave port) may be withheld if the master of a vessel has declined to take mails when officially requested. This power has never to lie enforced ns the world-wide operation of the Postal Union Convention, to which 84 countries, including New Zealand, are signatories, gives the mails a safe and assured “right of road” along every suitable sea route.