PARLIAMENTARY ENQUIRY

Hokitika Guardian, 17 September 1929, Page 5

PARLIAMENTARY ENQUIRY

TAUTO-ROTORUA RAILWAY

(By Telegraph—Press Association).

WELLINGTON, Sept. 17

Evidence was heard before the M. to Z Public Petilions’ Committee, in the House of Representatives to-day in Connection with a petition of Edward Vaile and eighty-eight others, asking that construction work on the T'aupoRotorua railway be resumed. Mr Vaile first of all asked for a Public Works estimate of the cost of a bitumen road be laid before the Committee.

i The Chairman (Colonel MacDonald) refused saying the subject" of thel petition was a railway, not a road, Mr Vaile then asked that witnesses should be sworn, hut it was pointed out this procedure was not adopted before a Parliamentary committee.

Mr Vaile referred to trie timber lands that would be opened up by the construction of. a railway. He said on every occasion that the railway had been before a Committee it had been unanimously recommended that it be constructed. He was afraid the Governent had looked into the matter from the point of view of £7OO,(XX) to be expended and no votes to be gained. He owned 10,000 acres, not on the route of the railway to Rotorua, but on an extension of the line to Tauno, which personally he looked upon ns inevitable. So his own interests were nil. As a proof of disinterestedness, he offered to sell the land to the Government for closeV settlement at the present value. . j The petition had the support of the Rotorua public bodies and the Farmers’ Union. They claimed it was a national crime to keep land locked up. In evidence of the productivity of the land he exhibited samples of root crops and displayed photographs. The area was the only one of its size in the Dominion which had no access by land or sea.

At this stage the hearing of further evidence from Vaile "was deferred. Albert Alexander Goudie, a forester, said he had been in charge of the State Forest activities in.Rotorua area practically since its inception, and was quite satisfied they would not get a fair run unless there was a railway. Tributarily to the area served by tfte line would be 300,000 acres Government and private forest land, capable, when fully planted, of producing three million feet of timber annually. If. due consideration was given to. afforestation the railway would lie built. ."•It had been/definitely shown before "a previous commission that the line would at least pay expenses. "Witness said the oldest would, be mHlable in fen years a faif? ""amount. fjf sawn timber would come out in fifteen years. There, would be £ jan increasing amount.after that. /. 7, ■ A. Hansson, representative of the Forestry Department su’d, it/ 25 to 30 years before the bulk of the timber wqu,ld be ready to come put/'j A number of farmers supported the statements made bv Mr Vaile as to the productivity of the ;land. /".f.