RAILWAY EARNINGS

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 154, 25 March 1939, Page 12

RAILWAY EARNINGS

Not Paying Working Expenses MR. HAMILTON’S CLAIM “Position Little Short Of Scandalous” By Telegraph—Press Association. ROTORUA, March 24. “For every £lOO earned by the New Zealand railways under the Labour Government for the financial year to date it has cost £lO3 9/- to get it. In 1935 it cost £B7 to earn £lOO. For years now the Labour Government with political control of the railways has produced a position which is little short of scandalous,” said the Leader of the Opposition, Mr. Hamilton, in an interview on his arrival at Rotorua today. Mr. Hamilton next week will carry out a tour of the Bay of Plenty district.

“Everybody knows the political quotation about fooling some or all of the people some or all of the time,” he added. “I want people to make no mistake about the spoon-feeding they are receiving today. In propaganda only the rosy side of the picture is ever presented. Since the people have to find the money, they are ultimately going to demand the whole truth, and when they hear it Labour s trusteeship will be indicted. “Mr. Sullivan yesterday . issued a statement, a feature of which was a claim for new records in railway revenue over a given short period and an expression of satisfaction that his recent similar statement had been found reasonably accurate. That Mr. Sullivan published these figures is not surprising. They are aimed to show that there is greater evidence of trade prosperity and improved domestic finances, but then someone has to support Labour’s policy of carrying water in time of drought in a can that is leaking at the bottom. “The facts people are more likely to understand and which they are entitled to be told are as follows:—-In 1935 it cost £B7 to earn £lOO on the railways. In 1936 it cost £BB/10/- to earn £lOO. In 1937 the cost was £92, in 1938 it was £96, and for the first nine months of the present year it has taken £lO3/10/- to earn £100.” Was it any wonder that the Government looked everywhere for a scapegoat on which to blame the fruits of its policy? continued Mr. Hamilton. Statements like those to which be had referred were being made to make bad fruit look like good to the people. The figures he had quoted were not the worst. When the Government introduced the increase of 10 per cent, in fares and freights in December last it had just discovered that for a year up to that time it had cost just more than £lO6 to earn every £lOO. That meant that the railways were not paying working expenses. They were not paying interest on the £56.000,000 capital outlay for the construction, and the public was being compelled to pay 6.19 per cent, for the privilege of control by a Labour Minister. Mr. Hamilton claimed that Air. Sullivan was overlooking the fact that many of the smaller and commoner costs involved in railway travel had increased by as much as 33 1-3 per cent, and 50 per cent. When t.ie price of a sandwich was increased by a penny, and when the price of a cup of tea was increased by a penny and so on, considerable increases in costs in the aggregate were being imposed upon customers. “The public, I believe, realizes tlie scandalous state of affairs, but its united protest lias vet to have its' full effect," concluded Mr. Hamilton. “When it does, in the phraseology of Labour propaganda, the running shoe will be on the other foot.”