AN UNFAIR INFRINGEMENT. INTERVIEW WITH MR POND.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 414, 26 October 1889, Page 5

AN UNFAIR INFRINGEMENT. INTERVIEW WITH MR POND.

Auckland, October 22. With refeience to the foregoin.tr cablegram, a Stak lepresentabive called this morning upon Mi J, A. Pond, the patentee of the enamelled butter box referred bo. On being a-ked if lie could explain in any way the extraordinary announcement conveyed in the cable message, Mr Fond replied thafc he was as much surprised as anyone on reading it. What, asked the reporter, does Mr Dow mean by saying that his department had beeii unable to obtain the right to the use - of Pond's boxes ? I know no more than you do, replied Mr Pond. I have never had any application on the subject from the Victorian (government, and. therefore could not have" rejected any. Besides, is it likely that 1 should decline legitimate business if it were offered ? Reporter : "No, that is not the sort of man you are, I should say. Is the patent fully protected in Victoria ? Mr Pond : Yes, fully protected, the renewal of the patent having been obtained only a few days ago. Reporter : But Mr Dow can't violate in this way the patent rights granted you by his own Government? Mr Pond : But they are doing it. I learn that the component parts of the enamel have been ascei tamed by analysis, and that they are now starting to make enamelled packages in imitation of our own. I believe by the terms of the patent granted the Government reserve some right by which they can under certain circumstances work a patent; themselves. But no honourable government would do such a thing without making liberal terms with the patentee, or at least entering into some sort of arrangement with him ; whereas in this case I have had no intimation from the Victorian Government whatever of their intention as announced in the cablegram. * Reporter : Why can't they import the boxes if they want them ? Mr Pond : Simply because they object to paying the duty they are subject to under the Victorian Customs tariff. I was willing to supply the boxes and to pay the d'lty on them provided the Government would allow a drawback of fche duty paid when the boxes were exported from Victoria filled with butter, but this suggestion they rejected. Reporter : What do you think has caused Mr Dow to take the action he is reported to have done ' Mr Pond : I cannot say. I may mention thafc we made some small twopound boxes specially f«.r the Melbourne Exhibition, where they were so greatly admired by Mr Wilson, the Victorian Government Superintendent of Dairies, that I made him a piesent of the lot, about 150, and afterwards an attempt was actually made to make me pay duty on this present I had ma'ie to a Government official for public purposes. The Agricultural Department wrote inquiring whether we could supply a lot of these two - pound boxes to them, and I replied with regret that we could not, as they were only a fancy exhibit in that size, and we had not the timber cub of the requisite sizes for these small boxes. This is the only tlrng that can by any possibility be t« isted into a difficulty about obtaining the butter boxes. The legular fifty-six pounds si/se they can procure at any time in due course by ordering them like other people. Reporter : Well, perhaps after all it won't do your business any harm to have such a strong testimonial to the value of your boxes as this desire to pirate the patent implies. Mr Pond : Oh, as to that, they apparently admire the invention only, too much to resist the temptation to utilise ifc regardless of the interests of the patentees. MrWm. Brown, Principal of one of the Victorian experimental farms, speak?, in a recent publication of his on dairy science and practice, in the highest terms of the excellence of the butter package. Reporter : About how many orders have you received for this season from the other side ? Mr Pond : About 14,800 for Kew South Wales, wheie a powerful syndicate ha.s been formed to establish a big export butter trade with Great Britain. And, by-the-bye, this same syndicate have secured practically all the cool carrying capacity available for butter from these colonies for next season — a serious matter for New Zealand butter exporters to consider.