Mail Services.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVI, Issue 196, 23 August 1904, Page 4

Mail Services.

THE VANCOUVER LINE

NEW ZEALAND'S PROPOSALS.

OBJECTIONS BY CANADA,

The Postmaster-General (Sir Joseph Ward) , lla( i e an j aleres , m . g 3 atement in the House regarding I the negotiations for. getting the Va£ couver service to call at Auckland.

Mr Buchanan asked what liad been 'done, and suggested that the Government had not displayed 'any activity in the matter.

Sir Joseph Ward, dm reply, reminded the House that in 1895 he had an agreement signed to bring the Vancouver service to New Zealand subject to the ratification of the House, and the House refused to sanction it. Had the House ratified that the Vancouver steamers would be coming here mow. Recently he had beeh in communiicaAion with the Ministers of the Crown in Australia with the view of getting Queensland to stand out of the service and let New Zealand come in. He had got this far—that Queensland had agreed to stand out if New Zealand 2ame in, but Canada, as the principal partner i n the contract, had to be consulted, and the Canadian Government objected om the ground that it would lengthen the service from Canada to go via Auckland to Australia. Since receiving that he had represented to Canada that it would not lengthen the route if Brisbane stood out. Queensland now paid £10,275 a year for the service. New South Wales paid on a weight basis £14,700, and Canada and Fiji Paid £35,000, making a total subsidy of £60,000. New Zealand had offered to pay £20,000 a year if Brisbane went out, and New Zealand came in, and they had represented the positiom as he had stated it to Canada within the past month.

| Mr Buddo said there was not sufficient encouragement given in connection with the 'Frisco mail servcefor the posting of magazines and parcels. The San Francisco service had now become so generally recognised that tho service vi a Suez and Brindisi was being neglected. Something should be done to get a speedy service vi a Vancouver when the present contract with the 'Frisco line ran out.

I Sir Joseph Ward said the 'Frisco , service was a good one in every possible respect. It was a faster service than the colony could get via [Vancouver. What the colony wanted I was to have both services if they sould bo got at a reasonable' cost, and he thought at would ibe reasonable if they got the Vancouver service for £20,000. If they could get lines of steamers from 'Frisco and Vancouver running to New Zealand the money would not be lost by any means.

Mr Laurenson said lie voted against the 'Frisco service last year, but in justiico to the Postal Department he was bound to point out that ten years ago that service with its connections in the colony and in America, cost £28,646, and last year it only cost £29,632, a very small increase considering that in the interval tho colony's postal revenue had been almost doubled. Sir Joseph Ward : And it's now a three-weekly service. Mr Witheford said the colony had every reason to be proud of the 'Frisco service.