N.Z. RAILWAYS.

Taihape Daily Times, 29 September 1919, Page 6

N.Z. RAILWAYS.

‘MORE LIGHT ON COAL SUPPLIES.

« WELLINGTON, Sept. 26. ’-The Railway Commission resumed its sittings this afternoon. ' « Ribert Atkins, chief clerk in the loco branch, chief ‘niechanical engin‘e.er’s office, said he had the business of obtaining coal supplies. The coal committees took charge ‘of distribution on Octobe"r'“'-1:, 1917. For the four-weekly period ended October 13, 1917, the reserve stocks of coal were 32,579 tons. From early'in 1916 until October 4, 1917, the Department received its coal‘ through «the Department of Munitions and Supplies. The DeP3“t' ment was rationed by ithe Coal Trade Committee, which over and over__agam was impressed with the absolute necessity of keeping UP Supplies ‘of ‘coal’ The same course had been followed‘ with the Munitions Department froml time to ‘ftime. The Railway Department ‘ did .‘not always receive the quantities‘ of coal required from the Coal Trade 1 Committee. On January 30th: 1913;} there were 45,901 tons of West Coast a shorft delivered, as against the D9_Pal't‘ men_t’s orders. The Coal Trade Com-1 mittee had diverted to other industries coal which had been previously alloca- i ted to the Railway Department. Gas Companies received a good deal of the I coal which had been diverted, Hehad ofitcn been asked to permit the diversion ofhcoal, but had refused to I agree. Various cargoes of coal were a arranged for from overseas, but 0111 many occasions the Railway Depart-i ment did not receive the full quantity 1 ordered, although it had arranged for! the supplies itself. I Mr Myers: Supposing you were not. required to obtain coal from the Munitions and Suppplies Department, could . you have obtained supplies outside for 1 the Railway Department? We could. ' Had the Railway Depart-' ment not. been rationed by -the Munitions Department, the railway services would not have stopped. I could have ‘got all the coal required to run the full time-table. Mr Myers: There were other indus‘tries requiring coal? .j Witness: The railways are the king ' industry of the country. - , Mr Myers: Quite right; but we may ' assume that if you‘ hadbeen making your own arrangements other industries would have suffered I Witness: They might not. Some in- i dustries in New Zealand use the best‘ Newcastle coal when lignitc would do. They use first-class Newcastle coal in stationary boilers, for instance, instead of leaving the dearer coal for the use of the railways. Some industries which could use lignitc coal prefer to buy the best coal.

_Mr Myers: Did you always inform the Munitions Department when you were getting coal fxom overseas? M Witness. No. I have had many hundreds of tons oflcoal landed in New Zealand ‘chair: the Mnuitfo-ns Department knew nothing about.‘

Mr Myers: bid you find any of these shipments .on the ;Mun'ition ‘(Depart-men-t’s list? '

Witness: Oh, yes. They all went on lg their lists as soon as they heard of 3 them.} ‘ _ , To thepchairman: Witness had been arranging for coal supplies since 1898. ‘ The shipments of coal received by the : Department were 8000 -tons‘ of naval ‘‘ coal in 1917. Where it came from he _~ did not know; but it was Itheniost awful rubbish the Department had ever obtained. It. was sometimes called Jap—-anese-coal, but. the Department did not ~ know whether it_ came from .Tapan.l Somebody in the Government ordered‘ it, and it took about a year to deliver, ‘ but it. was so bad when it arrived} that the Department would not -take it. It was worth about 7/6 a ten, but the price charged to the Railway Depart-l ment was 543 a toil_ The chairman: Up to 1917 ‘the Railway Department did not order coal from .-\merica or Afiriea? Witness: No. ' 'l‘lleellairl'nan: Have you ordered. any since? _ l, 5‘ 3171 Witness: Yes. I’ am gotfing 5000 tons of Alnerican. This will be the first shipment of American coal ordered by the Railway Department . All other American coal has been ordered by the Munitions Department through "(he High Commissioner. The ehairnlan: Have you ordered any Durban coal? Witness: NO. ‘ p ‘The chairman: Yer} have had nothing to do with any foreign orders except this? ' . ’

/‘Niitness: No, that is the only one. éWe could not ‘II'(LVC ‘Touched that except that We made a better deal than the High‘ C‘ol.llnlis‘,Siollf‘.l' coulfl have done.‘ '

The chaivsmanz I suppose half a loaf isbetter than no bread. If your St‘o<3kS were down to 2000 tons, as they Were in 1919, I suppose you‘would' be glad -to take anything that would burn’! ' “Witness: Yes, but it is no use buyihg coal half of which drops through the fil'eba{s and half goes up the chimncy._ It takes half ‘a day to gefi siteain up with some of it. Incidentally," it hauscd rioting among‘ the ’CngTno~

\'Cl'a‘ :m{x .’il'omen, who complain

about it getting into =tlleir eyes and clothes.

' The chairman. Yes; but reasonable coal does better than that. There is some reasonable coal that could have been got from America mad steps been taken to. get it i To Ml‘ Marchbanks: Durban coal had been Offered to the Railway Department, but the price was too high. More coal could have been got at ‘-he lprice. Every ton of Newcastle 0031 ’that had been offered «to the “Depart.ment had been accepted, also every ten of Westport coal and lignite. One {small shipment of Newcastle coal, about 2000 tons, had been decline=l_ as the freight asked (£3 15/ per ton was deemed to be »too high. Every ton of space offered by overseas shipping companies for the carriage of coal had been accepted.

In reply to Mr Hunt, witness rs‘-Zxifl the Munitions Depai-tnaeut. would not allow the Railway Depamuiwjt to stzmk up supplies of coal. When the war began there were 55,000 tons of coal on hand, and plenty of stocks worn in sight, If the Munitnons l)ep:al‘tmt':nT. hal left. the Railway Department alone the ltter Depamtnient could have got“ all the coal it Wanted. Mr Hunt: You could have arranged freightuif you had liked? , Witness: Yes. Mr Hunt: And the ?\lunition.s Department would not nave stopped you? 1 Witness: They would have in’r.m‘fcred .They had power under the regulations to take coal from us’. ‘lf We arranged the freight-S‘ We would have been paid for it. '

The only risk you would have to run by engaging freight was Lha; you would have lost coal?—Wg would have

lost coal and. freight. We did not order coal from overseas bocause they could have taken it from‘ us_ '

You could have got freight and coal, but did not do so because you thought the Muuitiong Department would take it?—-No, the Munitions Department are responsible for supplying the Railway Department xvith coal. ‘Anything We might have (.1-'_'>ile would have been outside their al'l'angé—mcnts. * The whole responsibility of supplying coal to the Railway I.‘!<—2pal'tment rested on the Muzl‘Ztiolls Department. The Railway 'l)ep.l'r.*.all=3llt takes no responsibility for the supply of coal. -

If you had not been subjec-.: to fn-i t7erfel'cnce by the Munitions Depart‘ ment you would have stocked up above - the normal quantity?—We would have done so. 1 What I‘ want to find out is, whose} fault it was you did not. stock up‘?——! The Munitions Departmtent for interforoncc. The chairman: Have you l1:1«:l any instructions as to what. stock to keep in hand —No. I have had no instru2tions, but I have had a lot of experiencc and I consider 50,000 tons of coal is sufiicient stock if you have coal in sight_ ‘What I mean by coal in sight is coal that would mat-erialise in a month or six weeks. Fifty thousand tons is about ten weeks’ supply and if coal is arriving in four weeks’ time 50,000 tons is sufiicient .~=tocl«: to have in hand. I had no instructions. I always acted on my own judgment. Mr Blair: You complain of interference by the Munitions Department. Has it over struck you they had :2 duty to poi-form—the duty of allocating ocal according to national ro-quirements.-—Yc-,s. ¢ ' You were only concerned with the matter from the railway point of Ivio*.\'?—That is so. ‘ L In reply to Lurther <;'u€‘stiolls:, Mr ‘Atkins stated that in extreme cases {the Railway Department had refused

to carry coal when it had been refused suppiies_ Mr Blair: If the Railway Dcpart~ ment had been left to do as it choose, without; any uossible restriction, it. "could have had all the coal in {Be Dominion and the rest of New Zealaud could have gone whistlil:g‘? Witness: That would have killed itself. V

In your «evidence, you said "the Munitions Depal‘tnlell«f. let‘ all this good coal go to burn in sl'ational'y‘(*ngien boilers and for domestic uses. Have you any documents to support that sltatenlcll't.‘?———.l pompliained to them

many ‘times. Mr Blair: ‘I know. But can yOll give any instance of where that has been done?—Yes, the Chelsea. Sugar VVorks burn nothing but Newcastle coal, although their stationary engine blo-ilers wiltl bzurn Elignilte eofl. The engineer says he ean’t burn anything else than Newcastle coal, but at one time they burned nothing else but Hikurangi coal. Have you any idea. what propor-tion of the total of hard coal produced in New Zealand the Railway Deparment got Before Ithe rationing gytsem came into force, and what proportion they got after‘?—Yes, but I am not going to speak to that from memory. Mr Blair: I suggcstthe proportion was 11 per cent ‘in 1914-—tha.=t' the Railway 'Departlnent. got 11 per cent. of ='tho total ha.rd co-al produced in and imported into New Zealand. Witness: Of course I do not know what is the ‘total quantity of coal produced and imported into New Zealand so I cannot contradict or confirm your statenlen"f.

Mr -Blair: Would it astonish you to know that in the firs-t. eight IIIOIItI2S of the current year the Railway Department got 19 per cent, eompared with 11 per cent in 1914; ~ -Witness: Well, the cut shows you that it is not enough. Would it astonish you to know that the Railway‘ Depaftnient‘ got 17 per cent of the hard coal in 1918?-——I cannot say one way or the other. Assuming these figures correct, can you sug*geS-t flla'~tl the Railway Department has been hardly tl'ea't'ed so far as its proportion is coneerned‘?——l am of opinion the Railway Department has been harshly treated. The General l\J'anagel"haé been immdated with oflers of coal from all over the country. The people who made «these oifers got the coal from the Munitions Depal"r.ment, and had coal to spare.

You state that coal has been ofi:'er—ed the Railway Department by the Mirnitions Department at a prohibitive rate. Do you remember the Munitions Department offering you coal in a vessel called the Georginia Rolfe, at a freight of 30/ per ton‘?-——Yes. We suggest that coal was ofiered to the Railxmy Departnmnt and refused? -——l‘;: was offered to the Department at 10/ a. ton over ol'dinary freight. Is that too nlueh‘.?——lt. is pre't‘ty rough on -.4000 tons.

Replying to Mr My-er:<, M 1: .~\.itkens said I'ha.t in cases where cal‘gc_>cs had been 1-efusecl the reason was solely because the "price: asked was pl'.o-hi-bitivc or 1n11'cuso11:1lJle.