OIL AND IRONSAND.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 75, 15 August 1912, Page 4

OIL AND IRONSAND.

PETITION i'OR A REFUND. (By Telegraph—Own Correspondent.) Wellington, Night. The Taranaki (N.Z.) Oil Wells Ltd. are petitioning Parliament for a refund of half of tiie £I2OO paid in Btamp duty on the purchase of their property from the Taranaki Petroleum Co. The petitioners claim that the money was provided in extending ail industry which, if successful, would be of immense benefit to the whole country.

STATEMENT BY MR. G. M. THOMSON. TARANAKI/S VAST HERITAGE. Wellington, Wednesday. ''There are vast deposits of oil .between Taranaki and Hawke's Bay," remarked Mr. G. M. Thomson, in an interesting discourse upon the mineral wealth of the Dominion. Mr. Thomson is an acknowledged expert in scientific matters, and his remarks on such subjects are always received with interest. Mr. Thomson went on to say that he had recently paid a visit to Taranaki, and he was certainly greatly impressed with the potentialities that had hardly been touched at the present time. The work was being done with a comparatively narrow bore, there wa« no plant for pumping, and they were making very little use of the gas coming from the wells. He believed that the development of the oil resources of Taranaki would do an immense amount of good to New Plymouth, and would enrich the country generally. Pointing to the great development in science in recent years, and of the possibilities of the future, he urged that they should realise that these huge mineral deposits should be taken care of.

IRON INDUSTRY. "ENORMOUSLY IMPRESSED." In regard to the iron industry, he said a syndicate had offered to develop this industry and offered to sell the product to the Government at cost price plus 5 per cent., and at the end of forty years hand oi/er the works to the Government. He hoped the Government would give careful consideration to this question. The country could not possibly look forward to iron production for export, in view of the cheapness of labor in India and China and the dearness of our own. It would be a very long time before we could compete with Hofcie \priee9 of iron, while a large proportion of coal would be required to develop certain kinds of iron in New Zealand. He was enormously impressed with the potentiality of Taranaki deposits, which were almost untouched as yet. He believed these would do an enormous amount of good to the country. Looking at the various methods of power utilisation, he was convinced there were possibilities which the mind could not grasp and no estimate of -what would happen in the next twenty years.