Correspondence.

Bush Advocate, Volume XIV, Issue 301, 23 March 1903, Page 4

Correspondence.

MY CHARGES AGAINST OUR RAILWAY ADMINISTRATION. (To the Editor.) Sik, — It has been suggested to me that it would do good if I would briefly formulate my charges against the Railway Department. I therefore make the following statement : — 1. That since 1897 our railways have made year by year nn increasing loss, instead of an increasing gain, as stated by the Department. 2. That in 1897 that loss amounted to £229,012, in 1901 £455,750, and in 1902 to £1,007,095. 3. That the gain said to have been made on our railways has been made to appear, by keeping the railway account on a system which, if practised by the directors of a private company, would certainly have sent them to gaol. 4. That our railways now are not contributing any interest on the cost of construction ; indeed, are not earning their working expenses. 5. That consequently the burden of transit charges is being rapidly removed from the users of the railways to the general taxpayer. 6. That the Government — not merely the present one — has distributed the expenditure in railway construction most unfairly. 7. That Canterbury, Otago and Westland alone have absorbed 53.46 per cent, of this, the result being that these provinces have more transit facilities than they require, and are fast becoming a burden on the rest of the colony. Wellington, Taranaki, and Hawke's Bay have had between them 23.74 per cent, and Auckland 16.73 per cent. That this unfair and unequal distribution, and which last year's appropriations will make still more unequal, cannot have been made in the interest of the people of New Zealand, but in the interests of certain districts and certain people only. 9. That the public records show that in 1897, after providing for working expenses and also all sums wrongly charged to capital account, under the heading " Additions to Open Lines," there was still a sum of £432,387 left towards the payment of interest, but that in 1909, taking the account in exactly the same way, there was nothing whatever left for interest, but there was, in addition to the disappearance of the £432,000, a further deficit of £105,640. 10. That there is favouritism in rating as evidenced by the fact that the charge for transporting each ton is always less in Canterbury and Otago than anywhere else. 11 That theDepartmentsystematically deceives the public as to the true position of its railway investment. As evidence of this I point out that Sir Jeseph Ward, the Minister for Railways, in October last told us that during the fir«t six months of the current year the railway revenue had increased £47,129 over the corresponding period of the previous year. The official records prove that the gross increase was only £17,978. Last month the Premier told us that the increase for 10 months was £125,587. The Gizette returns show that the grns^increase was 0n1y £49,041 and the net revenuß had decreased £21,591. In both cases the Ministers were careful to state that the. figures were telegraphed from Wellington.— -I am, etc. Samuel Vailb. Auckland, March 12, 1903.