INLAND AUSTRALIA

Hokitika Guardian, 30 November 1927, Page 3

INLAND AUSTRALIA

BIG RAIL LINKS

SYDNEY TO BROKEN HILL

SYDNEY, Nov. 16. Another big effort is being made in Sydney to work up somewhat sluggish opinion on tlie question of linking up the western railway system of Queensland with the western system of New South Wales, a project which, with tin extension to the Northern lerritoiv, has been advocated by the pastoral interests of both States for about a generation. If the railway lias to wait until there is a national clamour for it, then it will probably never be built, for the fact that Hie absence of this great connecting link affects consumers as well as producers is not appreciated by the general public, and, even if it were, it is doubtful il it would worry much about llie matter. The public is told, for instance, that the acute shortage of fat cattle in both Victoria and New South Wales is an illustration, in a direction which touches the consumers’ pockets, of the necessity for this rail link, hut it is doubtful if even that will inspire a national clamour for the work. Both in Sydney and in Melbourne prices for fat cattle arc higher now than they have been for years. There is not, it is said, enough local beef to meet requirements, with the result that from 500 to 1000 Queensland cattle are being yarded in Sydney each week, apart from considerable quantities of Queensland chilled beef, which are being retailed in Sydney and in Melbourne. Cattle; from querns la sn.

The point which is Uin- emphasised is that the suggested rail link would facilitate the transfer of fat and store cattle from Queensland, and even the Northern Territory, to New South Wales and Victoria, especially as severe drought is seldom racing simultaneously in Queensland and New South Wales; and that if the line was constructed consumers would ho reasonably assured of plentiful and comparatively cheap supplies of heef at all times. Consumers, from the look of 7t, ought to tie interested in this rail link. But it is extremely probable that, in their purely city obsessions, they do not care two straws whether or not the line is built, and that, if there is to he any propaganda to ho undertaken, the producers alone will have to get busy. BROKEN HILL.

A few days ago the first public passenger train for Broken Hill steamed out of Sydney. Considered economically and historically, it was a most notable event, even if it lacked that human interest appeal which grips thepublic above everything else. It means, in effect, that, after the long passage of years. Broken Hill, with all its riches and romance, is now on tlie New South Wales railway svstem. and is an integral part of the Mother State of the Commonwealth. The rich Barrier, for practical purposes, has always been regarded as a province of South Australia, although it has fallen to New South Wales to shoulder the cost of its government. Much of tlie Barrier trade, of course, will still go t< South Australia, which appears able to do with all the trade and money it lay its hands on, judgin'/, from its wholesale railway retrenchment. The fact that Adelaide is closer to Broken Hill than Sydney will still give South Australia something of a community interest with the “Hill,’’ but now that the Barrier is on the New South M ales railway system a fair bit of its trade must naturally he diverted to the Mother State As far as New South Wales is concerned, the Barrier cannot he said to have suffered from political isolation at least, for it has returned to the State Legislature men. who. on ltie slightest provocation, and often, it seems, with no provocation at all. have been tireless in their effort to keep it on the map. and to see that it- got a fair deal. One of these members even attained to the dizzy eminence of a Cabinet Minister in the illfated Lang stop-gap Ministry.