SUBSIDY NEEDED.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 206, 31 August 1936, Page 9

SUBSIDY NEEDED.

TASMAN AIR SERVICE.

MACHINES AVAILABLE.

With suitable machines now available the commencement of .a trans-Tasman air service now waits only on the decision of the Governments concerned to grant an adequate subsidy to the company which undertakes to operate the service, said Major A. Murray-Jones, representative in Australia for the do Havilland Ail-craft Company, who was a through passenger by the R.M.S. Niagara to-day. "In their latest flying-boats—the new Short model, for example—the British designers have produced the fastest as welf as the most comfortable machine of that type in the world," said Major Murray-Jones . "This is the type of aircraft best suited for a trans-Tasman service, because the designers, true to the British tradition, have not sacrificed comfort, safety and economy for miles per hour. I do not think, however, that any company could make a trans-Tas-man air service pay its way, for the present at any rate." First costs in the purchase of j machines and tlieir provision and organi-1 sation of repair shops and ground staffs would be heavy, he added. Government subsidies would be necessary for any company which undertook the work. The trans-Tasman service would not be unique in this. The companies operating air services in America received as much as 30 cents a mile subsidy from I the Government. Otherwise not one of I them would bo paying its way. All that | could be said about the trans-Tasman service at present, therefore, was that . the machines—the best in the world for 1 the job —were there, pilots and mechaniJ cians were plentiful, and the demand | for such a service was there, too. As I soon ai the Governments concerned ' decided that they could agprd to pay a I subsidy to keep the service going it would start, he was quite sure. Probably Imperial Airways would operate it.