CONTROL OF RAILWAYS.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 29 October 1924, Page 5

CONTROL OF RAILWAYS.

GOVERNMENTS NOT A SUCCESS. The Railway Commissioners, Sir Sam Fay and Sir Vincent Raven, who recently inspected the New South Wales railways, recommended that the Railway. Commissioners be given full control of their own funds and be responsible for the renewal of loans and the raising of future capital (the Taranaki Herald’s Auckland correspondent states).

Asked whether he was in favour of the proposed separate and independent Railway. Budget, Sir Mark Sheldon said he was for it heart and soul. He mentioned, however, that as his own evidence before the commission had been mostly along these lines he did not care to say very much on the point. It was mentioned to him that the adoption of a separate Budget was bein e advocated for the New Zealand railwav system in place of the present method of paying returns into the Consolidated Fund and having sums for expenditure voted by Parliament. He expressed his approval of this movement. and added: “If you get the palsied hand of a Government on these undertakings they are hound to suffer. T don’t say that you will not find some Governments able to run these affairs in a businesslike way. but in 99 cases out of 100 control bv the Government, by reason of their very machinery, is not a success.”