LIGHTS ON THE COAST.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIII, Issue 141, 13 June 1912, Page 8

LIGHTS ON THE COAST.

A3SD WiEl_n____R FO-_EO.__.TS. (By correspondent.) CIIBISTCHUROH, this day. Referring to affairs in the Marine Department to-day, the. Hon. Geo. Laurenson said that Government was considering a proposal to erect a lighthouse at Tongue Point, outside Wellington Heads and opposite to the place where the Penguin was lost about two years ago. Tbe Government bad gone carefully into the suggestion that a lighthouse should be erected on tbe Three Kings Islands, and had decided that there was no necessity for it. 'Formerly the .Marine Department sent weather forecasts to 100 stations in different parts of the Dominion. In future they would be sent to 101 more stations, making 201 altogether. The Government recognised that that information was* of great value to agriculturalists and pastoralists, as well as to those who were engaged in shipping, and arrangements had been made to enable all farmers who had telephonic communication to rceive . the . forecasts. Tho»e schemes, with the new Meteorological Obsemrory in Wellington and the staff employed would place the science of weather forecasts in N«w Zealand in a better position than it ever occupied before. The fact that the present customs law was founded on a reproduction of the original British Customs Act. passed over 100 years ago. demonstrated the necessity for altering it. There was strong feeling in the country in Tegard to the tariff, and as he had previouslyannounced, the Government was considering whether -or not the subjevt should be dealt with thi. year. If. would submit proposals to Parliament if it saw its wayclear to do so. There were about 100 workers dwelling in the Dominion nz present, and the Labour Department was negotiating for further blocks of land for dwellings in Oamaru, Mosgiel, Frankton, Na-pier, Wellington, and other centres.