CHARGES DENIED

Wairarapa Times-Age, 19 July 1938, Page 5

CHARGES DENIED

MINISTER ON RAILWAYS SERVICE •BETTER THAN EVER BEFORE MORE DERAILMENTS UNDER BOARD (By Telegraph—Press Association.) CHRISTCHURCH, This Day. “There were more main line and passenger train derailments under the Railways Board than there have been under my administration, and I can produce figures at the right time,” said the Minister of Railways (the Hon D. G. Sullivan), replying at Rangiora last evening to. what he described as “the unkind references” of the Leader of the Opposition (the Hon A. Hamilton), to recent derailments and accidents. Mr Sullivan declared that 23,000 railwayman very properly resented the foolish charges in Parliament of Messrs W. P. Endean and S. G. Smith, that they were due to lack of discipline. The efficiency of the railways was being improved, and figures would prove that the running staff was giving better and more efficient service than ever in the past. After criticising references, by Mr Hamilton, Mr Sullivan asked whether the greater number of derailments under the board was due to lack of discipline and were the frightful accidents that had been happening in England; South Africa and the United States also due to lack of discipline? “I repeat,” he said, “there is more discipline in the service today than there ever has been, more efficiency and better service given to the public than ever before in the whole history of the railways.”