LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIX, Issue 5327, 17 September 1928, Page 2

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The Dominion’s trade figures for the firqt eight months of the year show an increase of exports over imports of £14,182,641, as against an increase of £6,677,322 for the corresponding pericjd of last year. For the month of August, however, imports overshadowed exports, being £2,306,576 in excess, or njeayly £1,000,000 mere than in August, 1927. A male beauty competition is being, held at Hawera, with candidates nominated a.s tennis, golf, fishing, bowling, and citizens. The gross revenue from all so.urceS of the New Zealand Railways for the. past year was £8,524,'538, an increase of £89.884 on. that of the previous year, whilst th© 'expenditure was £6,685,123. an increase, of £194,213. The net earnings .amounted! to £1.839,415. or £111,360 better than was anticipated in the. forecast, given in the Minister’s Statement last year. The net reveto.ue amounted to £1,839,445, as compared with £1,943,774 last year, a decrease of £104,359 ; while interest charges increased from £2,043,433 to £2,130,867, or by £87,434. The committee appointed by the Paeroa. volunteer fire brigade, friendly societies, and football clubs has tq date raised a total of £47 9s 2d for Mr 11. Robinson. This amount is to be augmented by the pr.oce.edis from an “Oddfellqws Day” and. a social which is being arranged (for the evening. •A poll is to be taken to-morrow by the Hauraki Plaints County Council on the proposal tq raise a special loan of £4971 for the purpose of constructing; roads in the Patetonga riding, a s follows : The main road, from Pollen’s outlet to the northern boundary; Patel e,nga Landing road ; Top Road, from southern: boundary of county to Woodyard’s corner, and the Mangawhero read. A deputation representing the farmers cf Wajhi Plains and Waitekauri district waited on the Waihi Hospital Board last week and asked for the board’s co-operation in the extension, of the Waihi hospital district to include Waihi Plains, Waikino. and Waiteikauri, wihehi at present are inlcluded in the Tha,mes hospital district. Tlie deputation intimated) that a monster petition, is being circulated in support, of the proposal. The board agreed l that when ’ the petition wa“. completed) it would meet representatives of the .farmers in conference. A new phase of the. “bobby calf” trade has been developed by a Hauraki Plains carrier, who ha: commenced purchasing five-day-old calves at Ils per head and transporting them in his lorry to. the; weekly sale, a.t Westfield, where they are sold as vealers. As he pays two or three shillings more than the other calf buyers he can pick a,nd chopse, and only takes big healthy-looking calves which arc: likely to command a goodprice. ' “it i-.- 48 years this yqar since I Started farming in, Kaupokqnui (near Hawera),” said Mr W. T. Wells at the annual meeting of the factory, “and I do not remember a season when everything in farming looked so promising as to-day.” He added that he belonged to the fii”,;t dairy company operating in the district, and he was the only one. left to-day out of directors, nian.agers, and suppliers.