LOCAL AND GENERAL.

Taranaki Daily News, 31 December 1920, Page 4

LOCAL AND GENERAL.

The Taranaki Daily News will not be published to-morro« (New Year's Day), but, will appear as usual on Monday, with full accounts of the various sporting meetings, Davis Cup tennis competition, etc.

London advises a mail was despatched for New Zealand on December 23, per Rimntaka, via Panama. The value of produce from Weraroa Boys' Training Farm for the year recently ended was over £7OOO, There was an attendance of over 40,000 at the Auckland Racing Club'* meeting on Boxing Day. This .is understood to be the largest gathering of people on a racecourse in the Dominion.

A large number of Chinese arrived in the Dominion during this year. At Auckland alone no fewer than 751 landed, but of this number several had previously resided there. The amount received by the Customs Department by way of poll tax to date this year is £66,200. The Presbyterian Summer Bible Conference ,was officially opened at Hawera on Wednesday night, when the Mayor extended to the delegates a welcome to the town. The travelling secretary said the conference was the largest ever held in New Zealand, the total registrations being 1042. The weather is gloriously fine, and it is expected the conference will have a very pleasant week. Ah employee of a drapery firm at Dunedin, while leaving his firm'B premises in the early hours of Christmas morning, ran into the arms of a constable who, not being satisfied with the explanation tendered, detained him. Investigations showed that the arrested man was in possession of goods which, it is said, he intended to give away as Christmas presents. "I am 42 years of age," said a woman charged with being an incorrigible rogue, at the Christchurch Magistrate's Court, '•'and for the last ten years I have spent every Christmas in gaol. My mother used to say that, although the rest of the family used to gather together for QJiristmas, I was never there." Nor was she there this Christmasj as a sentence of twelve months' imprisonment was passed on her. In a reference to the eoming Imperial Conference, the Prime Minister reiterated his former statement that it would be impossible for him to attend the gathering. However, lie said, as Sir Francis Bell was going to England, and as, Sir James Allen already was in London, there would not be the necessity for the attendance of the head of the Government that had hitherto existed.

With reference to the plight of New Zealand-bound' immigrants stranded in Sydney, Mr. Massev said it was unfortunate that, through some mistake by the shipping people in London, a small number of immigrants booked passages by a steamer, the destination of which was Australia, and as a result of the shipping trouble were held up there. Of course, the Government could not allow them to be Stranded there, he said. If a mistake had been made, it was unintentional so far as they were concerned, and the Government thought it ought to see them through. They had been doing this up to the present.

The question of what classes of the. community can afford to have a motorcar, in these days of high prices cropped up in the course of the hearing of a tenancy action in the Christchurch Magistrate's Court last week. The defendant, who is the principal of an advertising agency, said, in answer to a question, that his income would not run to ft car. "As a matter of fact," said Mr. S. E. McCarthy, S.M., "the only people who can really run motor-cars these days are land agents and wool kings—and," he added, as an after-thought, "possibly drapers." > ° Further particulars are contained in Sydney newspapers of the steamer service which the Canadian Government Merchant Marine proposes to establish between the Atlantic seaboard of Canada and Australian and New Zealand ports. The steamers will use the Panama Canal, and the promised call on the return voyage at New York and other United States ports will open up a market to Xew Zealand and Australian exports. In Eastern. Canada there has been a notable development of manufacturing during the war and since. Much of it has been financed by American capital and made possible 'bv efficient American methods,

The Cabinet has agreed to contribute £4OO towards the expenses of the delegates who have been nominated bv the Now Zealand Returned Soldiers' Association to represent it at the conference of ex-soldier associations which is to be held in South Africa, in February under the presidency of Field-Marshal Lord Haig. The delegates in question are Messrs. C. W. Batten and W E Leadley. The Grand Council of ' the League of Comrades (South Africa) and the public of South Africa have decided to pay the expenses of Earl Haig's visit to the Union, and also to defray the expenses of all the other delegates for the fourteen days during which the conferenee will deliberate.

iilui'W™ 6111 fSir FrMeiß Hell expects to leave New Zealand for Sir g Fran R th , e „ Athe,,ic in March next. to matpT t 18 ° riginal intention was to make his trip a purely unofficial one. that h ° r6 -n K q, " te , 11 Btron " Probability that he will be called upon to represent tins country at the Imperial Confe nc which is to be held about the middle of the year. Whether he will have to do istel e k n liVV V ' lether the Prime Min " vkU „r i ? pare thc time tha t a mt to Lngknd would require. \fr w«ir ey » 11 Domin 'on reporter "in M eliington. that there was ?ery lifct] c probability of his being able to attend lie said, I want to see Samoa It «

"The Fashion Plate Dandies" w!m fird-f their . New Nymoutli season on Sat.l,day evening, will appear at Fltharn on Monday; Stratford,' Tuesday; Haworn,'Wednesday and Elmrsday evenings of next week. The company is .i„ excellent one, and is heartily ' recommended to the residents in the places stated. 1