EXCHANGE SYSTEM

Hokitika Guardian, 14 February 1933, Page 3

EXCHANGE SYSTEM

THE NEW ZEALAND RAILWAYS

BURDEN 7 of uvkGE DEBT.

The opinion -that (heat Britain could not wash its-hands of its responsibility Ito the colonies in transport policy, and the .question, of investors,having to accept a Composition fi/oiri ’ th,s colonies in l'espocl • of loans invested in .railways, ar, a t expressed by Mr Rees Jeffreys in a. paper, “Transport. Probipniii or the Ehipire,’’ read at the Royal Society of Arts in November. Air Jeffreys is chairman of the Roads Improvement Ai.jsocia.laon and a. member of the departmental 'committee on the Roads Improvement Association and a moniker of the departmental committee on the reguilation and taxation of noc.d vehicles, in addition to other • executive' positions'. in connection with transport. ' : “Transport conditions in . New Zealand, which- 1 bad -an opportunity of invo..tigaring.. personally two . years ago,”., Mr Jeffreys, stated,' ; ‘ ‘differ from thefie of Canada, South Africa and Australia, by ; r©a.son«of: the -fact that '•OP part of the country is more, than 100 -miles from the .sea.: Continental conditions do not obtain:-- There is no long railway haul like, that from Quebec to • Vancouver,. , or from Sydney ito Perth, or from Johannesburg to Capetown. - ,-y

“New Zc.ail.ah-d has no .great mining area- a long distance from the ooast, like tlie gold miii.es of,the Transvaal, or the copper.uni iids>iof Rhodesia, or the coal mmefe ’OfofiPonniry 1 van ia. It has spent £7o,tJl%o€MVin building rail---.r ays, many- Of ..which Aire Jiow Seen , to have been unnece-sarVi New Zealand- ’« rich in . -harbours." A -good system of roads a.ud motor transport, loupbxl with coastal steamships, and a minimum of .railways, would have olved the problems Of transport more wisely and economically. It is saddled with an expensive railway system much greater than it needs, .and which .may provei a miil'ktone about its neck. “G'peat Blivitain cannot wash itshands of its responsibility ...to the coloir’es and Dominions ip transport policy. Nearly all are oyer-railed and' undei'-roaded.- -Great .Britain has gone out to sell railways and they .have bought on our advice, pnd she.has knt them lqonoy to, build:- those- railways. So, loyg as. Great Britain could hbo’k sufficiently large orders for-rails arid' , Locomotive,&. the country was .prepared to give loans on tempting terms,, and' even tlx© benefit of the Trades Facilities Act, .■ without inquiring whether : the railway, in q nest ion would pay. “The. moneys the Dominions and colonies owe to this, country-for their 1 railways are generally greatly in excess of the persent capitat,yal'u§ pfl the ( rafk ways. The Governments of the-Einpiio ' Owning these, railways are trying; every means bo earn a return b:i the riii'iwav expenditure. As .or.e colonial 'staabu- , ‘We are engaged in ■killing.;the ■ road gopso which • kits. the.'taxation egg to ■keep alive the barren-railway hen.’

“I' cannot-see AustfakrD arid ' New Zealand, for 'exantpie,' doiitimiirig" to p ; ay. intereik on borrowed'moneys/which are. not Trow represented by tangible assets, or to repay the principal when this country ceases from any cause to lend them, money. The British investor is ‘carrying the railway baby/ and. one day mav be left with it.”