THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 1908. THE PENNY CABLE PROPOSAL.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 3048, 19 November 1908, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 1908. THE PENNY CABLE PROPOSAL.

Whether penny-a-worcl cabling: is practicable is very largely a question of finance. No one quarrels seriously with cheapness, and if it could be done at a halfpenny, "all the'better" would no doubt be the world-wide verdict on an immediate reduction to that figure. It is evident, too, that cheapened communications, whether over the cable or through the post, are universally beneficial in furthering business, and therefore in bringing peoples into closer and more amicable relations. But could the penny rate be worked without involving such a has as would outweigh the gains to be expected from it, indirectly as well as directly? The cables of the world have cost over £80,000,000, and are worth much more than that sum on the market now. To run them and provide for depreciation, on this basis, however, would cost, allowing for land lines and right on to delivery, about £20,000,000 a year. As that is not pro hibitive under present conditions,

it would not be so if the cables were bought by the Governments, as is suggested. But the system as it stands would not represent much more than the nucleus of a plant for a penny rate. The standing argument for a reduction in the cost of such services, and a good sound one, is that the cheaper rate will pay be- . cause the business will increase beyond proportion to the remission. That is otten the case when the reduction is gradual, but in thi3 case to make the change proposed would mean that before the present insufficient return on Australian cable business at three shillings could be reached, thirty-six words would have to be sent for every one that goes over the cable now. Therefore new lines would have to be laid, at a cost estimated by one of the speakers in the Colonial Institute discu ;sion of fri£ rnatter the other day to reach £170,000,000. Discussing the question of cheap cables, the Sydney "Daily Telegraph" states that the fact that a wide gap would remain between outlay and return is not necessarily a final answer in the negative to the reduction proposition. "A penny" has an alluring sound in discussions of this kind, but it is so far from being the only standard of advantage that if a penny were knocked off the present Australian rate to Great Britain, leaving it at thirty-five pennies, the irrepressible penny-champion might congratulate himself on something attempted, something done—though it is a very fair assumption that he will effect a good deal more than this. Suppose, however, the general rate could be'got down to a shilling, just double what cabling now costs between London and Paris or North America. The volume of business would undoubtedly increase, and if it did not do so to such an extent as to balance the cost, the benefit to both sides of easy, swift, and cheap communications would be commercially measurable. In any case, the matter is not wholly one of finance. There are other considerations, unfavourable as well as favourable, to the project. Notably, there i 3 the question whether, if the proprietary companies refused to make a material reduction —as they very probably would—it would be wise and practicable for "the Governments" to take the lines and the whole operation over. Under private ownership the cables have their neutrality in war-time guaranteed. Whether the undertaking would survive any severe test —whether a nation which saw an advantage in breaking it, and felt ■ strong enough to do it, would refrain —may be questionable, but the probabilities in that respect lools much more encouraging than they reasonably could look if the cable were the property of a belligerent. And which Government or Governments should own them? The idea of their passing into any particular national possession might naturally be objected to, even by countries which are not large cable users.