Wairarapa Times-Age THURSDAY, AUGUST 21, 1941. “MURDEROUS COMPETITION.”
J?ROM a national standpoint and in the public interest, what the Mayor of Masterton (Mr T. .Jordan) has called the ‘‘murderous competition” of electric power boards with gas undertakings demands attention. This was only one of the. questions raised at the meeting of the Borough Council at which the Masterton representatives on the Wairarapa Bower Board (Messrs 11. P. lingo and F. C. Daniell) gave an account of the board's affairs. Particular emphasis was laid on the high charges, in relation 1o costs, which Masterton has to pay for power and lighting services. It will be interesting to hear what the board has to say on. this subject, and also if it approves the present scale of representation on its membershrip and if so on what grounds it considers that scale justified.
While these questions and others should not be neglected, all concerned may be able to agree that the existing conditions of competition between electricity and gas undertakings are at variance with common sense. In this district, for instance, (Ireytown. has had its municipal gas undertaking killed by competition, but gasworks loans remain as a load upon the borough, to be repaid over a period of years. There is not much doubt that under methods paying true regard to public interest, hardships of this kind, to a great extent, could be eliminated or avoided.
The policy that ought to be adopted is that mentioned by Mr Daniell at the meeting of the Masterton Borough Council, on Tuesday evening. The proper thing, he said, would be a unified control of gas and electricity undertakings. This appears to be the obvious solution where both undertakings are owned by the community. There is no gain or triumph for the community in one undertaking being allowed to destroy another. The net outcome in that case is a loss to the community—a loss which might have been avoided in. whole or part had more sensible methods been adopted.
Even where a given gas undertaking is shown to be uneconomical, the loss involved in closing it down might at least be reduced under a wisely-directed co-ordination of services. Extended experience throughout the Dominion suggests, however, that in many instances electrical and gas undertakings are, and are likely to be, capable of giving useful service side by side in the-right conditions of control. Conditions in which one undertaking financed with public money is allowed to destroy another, also financed with public money, call at least, for careful examination.
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Wairarapa Times-Age, 21 August 1941, Page 4
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420Wairarapa Times-Age THURSDAY, AUGUST 21, 1941. “MURDEROUS COMPETITION.” Wairarapa Times-Age, 21 August 1941, Page 4
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