The Hawke's Bay Times, Published every Monday and Thursday. THURSDAY, 6th SEPTEMBER, 1866. NEWSPAPER POSTAGE.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 8, Issue 409, 6 September 1866, Page 2

The Hawke's Bay Times, Published every Monday and Thursday.

THURSDAY, 6th SEPTEMBER, 1866. NEWSPAPER POSTAGE.

“KUUxIUS AJDDICXCS JURARV. IN VERBA atIQISTRI."

Although it was pretty well understood that the late ministry intended to fulfil a threat recently held out to cripple by postal taxation the smaller and more independent journals of the colony, we hoped and believed that a change of ministry would afford a means of retreat from such a hostile attitude, and that, having learnt from the disapproval which has been so generally expressed of the obnoxious scheme, a new ministry would hesitate to follow so questionable a course. However it seems that in this we were mistaken, A new postal committee has sat aud has brought up its report to the house, and in this report it is recommended to impose certain postal charges upon all newspapers transmitted through the post office out of the province in which they are published. The changes recommended to be made are briefly that a postage of threepence should be charged upou all newspapers transmitted from this colony to Europe, either by way of Panama or Marseilles, while if sent via Suez aud Southampton, the charge is to be one penny. .Newspapers sent from one province to another will require a penny stamp, while letters heretofore charged twopence, will in future cost threepence fur transmission. We can have no hesitation in condemning the proposed alterations as being calculated to inflict incalculable injury upon the colony. There can be no question of the good that is done by the flood of information spread abroad by the myriad copies of New Zealand newspapers which now go by each mail to the Mother Country, and scarcely less that to the heretofore free transmission of those papers is mainly owing much of what is correctly known and understood of us there. It has been one mark of wisdom of past New Zealand parliaments that they have been able to appreciate to some extent tbe advantages derived from tbe due encouragement of this cheap and easy method of diffusing information amongst the masses at home respecting this the most highly-favored by nature of all Great Britain’s colonies, and they have not misjudged in the matter, for thousands of immigrants have, by means of the papers so received, and the information by them conveyed, been induced to locate themselves amongst us. Does the existing government imagine that so valuable a colonising agency is no longer needed ? Is all known in tbe mother country respecting New Zealand that it is necessary should be taught ? Has the newspaper press done in this direction all of which it is capable ? or do we hereafter require no further accession of population ? Each of these queries must receive its self-evident negative. Great as has been the amount of information shed abroad over tbe United Kingdom by the New Zealand press, recent events show that infinitely more remains to be done. People of all ranks and classes have to be disabused of a multitude of erroneous ideas which they now hold to the great disadvantage of the colony at large, and for the correction of which the present system of free transmission of colonial papers is the best possible engine. In this respect its labors may be considered but as commencing, for it is of late, as tbe postal statistics plainly show, that this free transmission has been more extensively availed of, and each mail continues to con* vey an increasing number, so that the work of spreading abroad valuable information to the British public is constantly being better and more fuily done. Each of the leading journals of the Colony prepare, specially for the British reader, a monthy summary of intelligence, and this is a feature of comparative recent origin, yet one that has been attended wxth jsachjaarkedjsuccess that the

number of such summaries forwarded by each mail are counted by thousands, and the number progresses with marvellous rapidity. No one of common reflection can for a moment doubt the beneficial effect produced on the Colony by the influence of these papers, nor that to them we are indebted for the arrival amongst us of many scores of immigrants whose first ideas of New Zealand life were obtained from their perusal. It is also evident that the number of such will increase with the development of the same course, or be retarded in like manner by any check that may be imposed.

And wby is it proposed to abolish so im portant a colonising agent as the free transmission of newspapers has proved ? Is it supposed that the revenue of the Colony will be materially henefitted by the change ? We believe that such is the mistaken notion entertained by the Government. They seem to reason on the supposition that the number of papers posted will suffer no material decrease on account of the postage, and that a revenue will in future be raised from this source equivalent to a tax of the proposed amount on the papers now transmitted. If so, we can confidently assert that they were never more deceived in any calculation of estimates than they will be in this. It is, in fact, the free transmission of those papers that causes them to be sent, and a tax on their transmission would operate as an effectual prohibition except in a few exceptional cases. We have no doubt of it doing this to the extent of at least ninety per cent., and the papers by each mail will be numbered but by hundreds instead of by thousands and tens of thousands.

Nor is the proposed tax’upon inter-provin-cial transmission less objectionable. There can be no doubt that it will eventuate in the ruin of many of the proprietors of the smaller papers, and the manifest injury of all; but it is not alone upon grounds such as these that we condemn it. The greatest political economists of the age are agreed that the prosperity and progress of any community are in the ratio of the facilities enjoyed for free communication and reciprocation; and that it is a great error to attempt to derive revenues from any means that obstruct or retard these, so that the true policy it would seem in such cases would be to support the postal system in great measure from other sources than its own proceeds, confident that its benefits are more than an equivalent to the expense so incurred. These remarks apply to all means of inter-communication ; —the opening up of the country by roads and railways; the establishment of steam communication between the several ports of the Colony; and the extension of the lines of telegraph ; —each and all of these tend in a gx-eat degree to the advancement of civilisation, and progress in material prosperity; but we think that that of the greatest importance —and at the same time most under the control of the Government—is the postal system, and that nothing should be done calculated to obstruct the rapid and free transmission of intelligence between the several districts of the Colony. Although we place the public good as the first consideration in our opposition to the proposed tax, the other aspect of the question must not be altogether lost sight of. There is perhaps no class of the community whose returns are less on their investments than that of the newspaper proprietors, as there is certainly none whose avocations demand more toil, anxiety, and care. Competition one against another keeps their several journals actually in advance of what is warranted by the proceeds of their labor, and ever and anon we hear of one and another who, unequal to the struggle, has fallen, and is seen no more. It is certain that this is as true of the leading, as well as of the more unpi-etending of the colonial journals. Neither are able to bear extra burthen and maintaiu their present standing. They must retrograde, and their degeneracy can only re-act upon the Government and the whole community in the most prejudicial manner that can be conceived.