QUITE IMPOSSIBLE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 18 August 1938, Page 8

QUITE IMPOSSIBLE

POWER BOARD INSPECTIONS. REMIT TO CONFERENCE. (“Times-Age” Special.) “We have got to the stage where it is quite impossible to carry out a proper inspection every five years,” stated the chairman, Mr A. C. Pearce, when referring to the following report submitted to today’s meeting of the Wairarapa Electric Power Board by the Secretary-Manager, Mr G. Brown: “The Public Works regulations provide that once every five years the board must carry out a proper inspection of every installation in its district. This necessitates in our case, in addition to the inspection of all new installations and additions to installations, the proper inspection of approximately 1200 installations per annum, together with the necessary recording, indexing, filing and notices to consumers. This is a big and expensive undertaking and whilst it is admitted that re-inspections are necessary, it is the considered opinion of the engineer’s branch of the Power Boards’ Association that the five years period of re-inspection is unduly burdensome and out of proportion to the results obtained. As a result, a remit was passed at the Power Boards’ Association Conference asking that the period be extended to 7 or 10 years. “The Minister has, however, refused to alter the regulation, and the Department is insisting that it be strictly carried out in its present form. We have, of course, carried out a big lot of re-test work, but on account of the large volume of new work going through and the difficulty in getting men backed up to a certain extent by the hope that the period of re-inspec-tion would be increased, the work is behind to quite an appreciable extent. Steps will have to be taken to assist the three present inspectors, and this will mean additional annual cost.” It was decided to forward a remit on the subject to the Power Boards’ Conference.