FREIGHT QUESTION.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1737, 1 May 1906, Page 3

FREIGHT QUESTION.

(To the Editor Gisborne Times.)

Sir, —If it were not for the faot that many cf tbe farm’ng community who do not know Mr W. D. Lysnar might be misled by hia emphatic statements on (he freight question, it would bo ridiculous to notice his utterances, as they are generally ohiefly roma'kable for their unreliability. That there is another side to tbe ques> tion is apparent from the exhaustive artioles in tbe Wellington Truth of April 14, the Mercantile Gaz t‘e of April 12, and the comprehensive letter of Mr J. G. Harness (Broretary National Dairy Association) in answer to Mr Lysnar in the Farmers’ Union Advocate of April 28. From these articles it would certainly I seem that this Federal-Holder-Sbire-

Bucknall combine (which also works in oorjunotion with the P. and 0. and Orient lines) is odb from whioh wo have at least quite as muoh to fear as the established lines, for this combine appears to adopt the methods usually asoribed to Amerioan tru-ts, and is engineered with exceptional, although unostentatious. skill. When the taxpayers of New Zjalacd were paying this company, which is now expected to reduce freights, a subsidy of £30,000 per annum for tbe South African service, it carried butler for tbe Commonwealth at 3-Bths of a penny as against r ur rate of 6 Bths of a penny. Farther, it is said that these contraot steamers frequently carried shipments for tbe Imperial Storage Company at 1 -X6th of a penny less freight than our own and Australian meat exporters paid per lb. Of oonrse this combine is quite right in using its tonnage as it secs fi*, but is our Grvernment justi. Bed in subsidising a line which floods the Home markets with tbe produots of our great rival Argentina as these lines do? Among tbo probable reasons • why freights are cheaper from Australia than from New Zealand, are that the total volume of trade of the former is about thiee and a-half times as great as from our shores, that tbe season for produoe in Australia is longer than ours, and further, that port dues are heavier, and commodities suoh as meat, ship's stores, and ooal, are more expensive here. It is not my intention, sir, to quota exhaustively from tbe art'oles I have referred to, but rather to draw the atten'ion' of anyj who may bo interested in the subject of cocao freights to them. No doubt tbe writers have not the expert knowledge enjoyed by Mr Lysnar, but, nevertheless, they seem to have been able to provide a good deal of food for reflection.

Io oonclusioD, I would congratulate tho directors and shareholders of the Gisborne Sbeepfarmers’ Freezing Company on the method they havo adopted to advertise the business of the Company, and at tbe paras time the imporia tea of their Board. I may further add that, for obvious rea sons, I do not propose to enter into controversy with Mr Ljsaar, although I might be induo.'d to orass swords with anyone worthy of consideration. —I am, oto., W. LIBSANT CLAYTON. Gisborne, April 30th, 1906.