PETROLEUM.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 93, 15 May 1909, Page 6

PETROLEUM.

UK. BERRY'S RESIGNATION. The following is the text of Mr. D. Berry's letter to his fellow-directors in which he resigned his position as chairman and director:— -New Plymouth, May 12, 11)0!). The Directors Taranaki Petroleum Co., Ltd., Now Plymouth.

| Gentlemen—l beg to tender by resignation us chairman and director of your company as from the (late hereof. I take this step with extreme reluctance and some regret,, but the decided difference of opinion existing for some time past between any fellow directors, as a body, and myself on the subject of management, culminating as it (lid in the late action of the directors in appointing the present manager for a further term, at the same enormous salary, leaven me no other course. 1 am entirely free of personal animus against the present manager, but I should lack a sense of duty to the shareholders who did me the honor to elect me to watch their interests in the company if I did not voice an emphatic protest against the action of the directors in this matter of management. As chairman it has been my province to come more in technical contact with the present manager and his work, and with all due respect 'to you, gentlemen, I believe I am butter able to assess his practical value to the company than yourselves. With this knowledge, I unhesitatingly affirm that the company has a right, for sucTi a very huge expenditure, to a much greater measure of practical administration, initiative, and guidance in its uffairs than has hilherto been shown. Further, there was, in my opinion, no call to undertake to pay the manager a bonus in addition to his salary, in the event of commercially payable oil being obtained. That is a consummation which no special skill of his can in any way command. All ho can do, or, rather, all the drillers under his guidance can do, is to go on sinking in the hope of further oil veins being struck, and the company is already paying him such an adequate salary as to entitle it to his' utmost vigilance and skill in that direction. Again, the directors have placed a power in the manager's hands, in giving him carte blanche authority to discharge drillers for any or no reason, which I do not think any merely salaried officer of the company should possess, except subject to the revision of the directors. On all these points, as you are aware, we are at issue, and I think that, in view of a want of unanimity concerning them, the directors' should especially not have committed the company beyond the annual meeting, thus giving the shareholders—among whom are many (probably a large majority) dissastisfied with the management—an opportunity of voicing their opinion on such important issues involving the policy of the company. You may consider me prosumntuous in setting up my opinion against five or six other directors, but if I do so it is only because I have watched proceedings much more closely and more often visited the wells than yourselves, and having some practical mechanical knowledge, I am, perhaps, rather more competent to judge of the value of the work .being done. At any rate, it is my honest opinion, even if erroneous, and I should, holding that opinion, fail in my duty to the shareholders, 36 before stated, if I did not protest, even against such odds. Regretting that I have to express myself thus' outspokenly, and thanking you for past courtesy in the earlier and happier days of our association,—l remain, gentlemen, vours truly, D" BERRY."