THE CLAMOUR FOR CURRENT

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 830, 26 November 1929, Page 8

THE CLAMOUR FOR CURRENT

IF one development of progress more than any other has improved rural conditions in recent years it is the provision of electric light. Ten years ago it was rare to find electricity in country homes. ’ A few envied station owners had got it by harnessing streams on their properties, but the great majority of homesteads were still lit by flickering oil lamps. Perhaps because they had not experienced the wonderful advantages conferred by electricity in the country, farmers were not very responsive to the first suggestions that it should be provided for them, and the Electric Power Boards Act of 1918, creating organisations for the distribution of power, was actually subjected to strong opposition, particularly from those farmers who already had power plants of their own. Today this hostility has been supplanted by a strong sentiment in favour of electricity, and farmers everywhere are clamouring for reticulation to be advanced into their districts. The Waitemata Power Board, whose gross revenue has increased from less than £20,000 in 1927 to over £70,000 this financial year, is still connecting new consumers at the rate of 70 a month, and to facilitate its work of expansion is inviting its ratepayers to approve a £IOO.OOO loan schedule which will be submitted to them tomorrow. If the board’s electors, who cover territory predominantly rural or semi-suburban, study the interests of their district, they will without hesitation give their approval to a scheme which exhibits all the marks of sound planning and prudent finance. While asking for authority for £IOO,OOO, the board explains that it is only asking for this sum in order to save the expense that would be incurred in submitting piecemeal loan proposals to the electors. Only £30,000 is to be raised immediately. The balance will’not be lifted until the results of the first expenditure are apparent both to the public and to the Local Government Loans Board, which now exercises a stringent supervision and final determination over all local authority loans. Of the £30,000, most will be absorbed by the beneficent work of continued reticulation. High-tension reticulation will be carried to Whangaparaoa, Silverdale, Waikuku Valley, Wainui and Motutara, while there is provision for continued expansion within the already reticulated area, and also for giving financial assistance to those consumers who have not the resources to obtain full benefit from the reticulation immediately it is completed. By proceeding on a cautious guarantee system, the board assures itself of interest charges, and in view of this the ratepayers should have no hesitation about tomorrow’s verdict.