THE TIMBER INDUSTRY.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XVI, Issue 4958, 22 February 1895, Page 3

THE TIMBER INDUSTRY.

[in Till; llUITOli]. Sib,—l see in your issue of 20th | inst,, 11 letter signed" Timber," deal- i ing with the injustice of the local i bodies in imposing n poll-tax on '■ sawmillers of far greater proportion ' than that imposed on John China- '' man. If you will taken glance at ' the names of the members of the Road Board and the County Council, ' you will find tl.nl they mostly belong to the great Conservative Paity, '. the party that raised such an outcry ■ when the present Government proposed to put a laud and income tax j on the holders of large blocks of 'land, but who, now that they think they can see an opportunity, evidently wish to retaliate. For impart,! cannot see why Hid siiwmillers should be singled out to pay this enormous tux. Surely they are not tbo only individuals who make use of the roads in the district. The conches and brakes and firewood drays-all with narrow wheel-tires —do fur more damage to the roads than all the sawmill trall'ic, and why they should escape the ' tax, is more than I can make out. "With regard to the road through Parkvillc, which is the one I cart my timber over, it has never been in ut proper state of repair. In the first place, it was not properly metalled, as anyone with ut knowledge of road-making can testify; then there is no roadman to look : after it, the consequence being, thai every season since it was opened, I. have spent at least X,lh to £2O on it, to make it passable at all. This is surely it sufficient tax on one small sawmill, considering that the extent to which 1 use the road, does not amount to one waggon load a day, on the average. There is no doubt your correspondent " Timber " is correct when lie says that sawmillers have reached the very bed rock prices for their timber, and should this inii|uitous tax be imposed on them, the only way for them to recoup themselves will be to put on an extra two shillings per hundred feet on nil timber disposed of locally.—l am etc., F. Bright. [lt isthogrent Liberal Party and not the great Conservative Party which is responsible for the new tax En. W.D.T.]