WELLINGTON TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, 16 August 1918, Page 7

WELLINGTON TOPICS.

COAL. FAMINE. , BOARD OP TRADE REPORT. (Special Correspondent.) Wellington, August 12. Thetreport by the Board of Trade upon the coal supply of Wellington has not brought much comfort to the sorelytried housewives of the city. It merely confirms what the Minister of Supplies (the Hon. A. M. Myers) and the Minister of Mines (the Hon. W. D. S. Macdonald) have been telling the public for some months past. There is a very real shortage of coal throughout the country, and the shortage is affecting Wellington more acutely than it is affecting any of the other large centres owing to its distance from the sources of supply. Lignite slack is placed on the trucks at the. Waikato mines at iis a ton, but the rail carriage to Wellington amounts to 15s (id a ton and the loss in transit from one cause and another to Is 6d a ton. It is plain that neither the merchants- nor the retailers are making excessive {rionts, but it is equally plain that the consumers are getting very poor value for their money.

THE ABSENT MINISTERS, It is being assumed in some quarters that, owing to the improved war outlook, the return of Mr. Masaey and Sir Joseph Ward to the Dominion will be delayed, and that the session of Parliament expected to open in October will not bo graced by the- presence of the party leaders, at any fate during its earlier stages. The Ministers here, of course, are very reticent in regard to the matter, as they naturally are on all matters concerning the movements of the travellers; but there appears to be no good ground for supposing that the return of the leaders will be postponed on account of what has happened on the Western front during the last week or two. The magnitude of the Allies' success need not be underrated, but it is not likely to lead to the long-desired Peace Conference this year, and nothing less could keep Mr. Mas'sey and Sir Joseph Ward away.

THE PROHIBITION CAMPAIGN. The promoters of the prohibition campaign for a referendum on the proposal of the National Efficiency Board to buy out the liquor trade profess to be confident of obtainbig a petition to Parliament which will bo far and away the biggest tiling of the kind ever seen in the Dominion. The great petition for the extension of the Parliamentary vote to womeu bore between 30,000 and 40,000 signatures. This petition, if the expectations of tho promoters of tr.e movement are realised, will bear at least 300,000 signatures, and probably 400,000. The electors here, however, have not yet grown enthusiaatio over the matter. Had the campaign been launched immediately after the presentation of the board's report, it would have had a better chance of success than it has now, 0 o'clock closing having very materially lessened tho "hirried examples" thai were inclining the* public towards the still more drastic reform.

. THE -GERMANS JOKE. Though the ditecovery! of the four supposed German escapees under oils of the buildings at Somes Island has set Wellington laughing at the joke the men played upon the authorities, it lias not restored public confidence in the methods adopted to secure the safe custody of interned enemy subjects. The official report upon the last escapade of the kind, in •which ouo prisoner, deserted by hj% comrades in an attempt to reach the land, was drowned, has not yet reached the Minister, but there is a feeling abroad t>ai the British way of "doing good to your enemies" had led to a certain amount of laxity which might easily bo attended by serious consequences both to the prisoners themselves and to the community. However, in a matter of this kind a jest with the laugh against the authorities may do more than a tragedy to mend matters and already it is announced the guard «M .Jwfc^enjjheaedj