THE MATAMATA RECORD. THE MATAMATA RECORD, THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 1923. CONTINUOUS TELEPHONY.

Matamata Record, Volume VI, Issue 493, 29 November 1923, Page 2

THE MATAMATA RECORD.

THE MATAMATA RECORD, THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 1923. CONTINUOUS TELEPHONY.

The Only Paper Published in the Matamata County.

MATAMATA, town and county, has a lot to thank the farming community for. And the local mouthpiece of the ‘"arming commu.nity is 'the Matamata branch of the Farmers’ Union. This live and diligent organisation has done much in the past not only with regard to matters affecting the farming interests of the district, but in the absence of a Chamber of Commerce or similar quasi-public body, it has on many occasions stepped into the breach and striven whole-heartedly for the successful bringing-about of civic innovations and reforms. But on Saturday night it looks as if the branch made “ a bad break.” The occasion was the coming-up for review of the question of a continuous telephone service for Matamata. With the exception of the clerk, Mr. B. Blennerhassett, who was perhaps the most . urban member of the branch present and whose remarks were to a certain extent non-committal, the opinions expressed by the farmers present were distinctly hostile to any extension of the existing services. This attitude of the branch seems passing strange. The cost of a continuous telephone service appears to be so infinitesimal when compared with the benefits accruing therefrom that it is hard to understand how a body of men? endowed with practical disas the Matamata branch of - the Farmers’’{Union can logically defend the attitude taken up by it. To slightly digress perhaps, let what conditions must be present officially to justify the institution of a continuous service be credited. Telephone exchanges -with over two hundred subscribers are classed by the Department as fourth-grade, but under No. 56 of the Regulations it is laid down that should a substantial majority of both the business and the residential subscribers so desire, then such exchange may, on their application, be raised to the third-grade status and accordingly be entitled to a continuous telephone service. The majority required in both instances is a twothirds one, or in other words there be. a,.two-thirds minimum majority of ali subscribers in favour, of extension, and of these at least one half in favour of the change must be residents and the other half business men. Now the people of Matamata should be congratulated on the fact that their gratitude is so well over the two-hundred-subscribed mark as to justify their right of claiming a continuous service under the regulation referred to. For the comparatively small cost of fourpence halfpenny per week each subscriber to the Matamata exchange can have his telephone working continuously, clay and night, Sunday included. And if this is a cheap proposition to the business people and town residents of Matamata, who we have every reason to believe are, to a man, in favour of it, would it not surely prove of even greater value to the farmer. There is first of ail the material advantage that is going to .be enjoyed by him under a continuous service. If, at present, his electric power fails on a Sunday or before seven o’clock any morning, well he has no means of telephonic communication with the Power Board’s “ troubleman,” and time and money is lost thereby. Surely if only as an insurance against this possible deprivation, fourpence half-penny is worth while! Then there is the mufch more personal phase of illness. In the case of sudden sickness or an accident there is no way of summoning medical aid by telephone during the periods mentioned. This is neither the time nor the place for what the man in the street calls “ sob-stuff,” but one has only got to pause and consider, if it were to result in the death of one near and ■ dear to him, how bitterly the farmer (or, for that matter, any one else) woujjd .-regret his opposition to the We are quite certain, however, that Mr. A., Bowler was overestimating the opposition when he said that practically every farmer would be “dead against’’ a continuous service. Our opinion of the farmer is of too high an order to allow us to believe for one moment that on seriously considering the phases presented he would ever allow a paltry fourpence half-penny a week to stand in the way of his advocacy of so great a public service as continuous telephony >3/