ACUTE POSITION.

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 182, 4 August 1939, Page 11

ACUTE POSITION.

MAW HIGHWAYS.

CHROMIUM PLATED ROADS. <By Telegraph.—Parliamentary Reporter.) is WELLINGTON, this day. "The position of the Mail* Highways Fund was becoming most alarming, said Mr. A. E. .lull (National. Waipawa), a former member of the Highways Board, in the H.nise of Representatives yesterday. This, he explained, was due to the increasing interest and redemption charges loaded upon its finances.

Perhaps most people were not aware, said Mr. Jull. that only Kd per gallon of the petrol tax went to the Highways Board, which ]ia<l been obliged to borrow extensively, so that this year its loans totalled £7.077.000. Tt w;ts proposed to spend this year EViTIi.OOO on highways, which meant he believed another loan for £.">00.0«0. Interest and redemption payments amounted to 7 per cent, so that' £"00.000 of the board's revenue was required to pay for loans. He. enumerated other liabilities, including subsidies, payable by the board, which brought its expenditure on matters apart from construction and maintenance up to £1,0U2.00Q annually.

The position, declared Mr. .Toll, was becoming; acute, and the board would be asking for more revenue. "Those people who have been applauding the wonderful road construction programme of the Minister of Public Works." added Mr. Jull, "had better wa.ke up to the fact that they will pay very dearly for what I call the extravagant chromium plated roads which are being built, to the neglect of many thousands of miles of more important highways. There are 30,000 miles of roads in this country which have not received a pennv from the Main Highways Fund."