The Railways

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 20039, 22 September 1930, Page 10

The Railways

Thursday's and Friday's debates on the Railway Statement boil down into the expression of three points of view. There was first the Minister's vague talk about the virility of the race and the vast potential wealth of New Zealand, plus his declaration that the railways could be made to pay their way on paper if we adopted a different system of book-keeping. There was the argument of the Leader of the Opposition, that the railways are being ruined by politicalism, and that the remedy is placing them in the hands of an efficient and independent Directorate. Finally there was the calm suggestion of the Labour Party that State railways exist for service and should not be expected to pay their way, and that putting off men for whom no proper employment is available is quite unjustified. Yet it is to the collective wisdom of the three Parties that the reports of the two Commissions will be submitted for the evolution of a policy. Mr Veitch must have been brooding over the remark of the General Manager that by various strokes of the " policy pen" the Expenditure Account was loaded last year by approximately half a million pounds. By the Department's "al- " truistic " expenses he perhaps meant the loss of £736,000 on developmental lines, the £84,000 which was the Railway Department's proportion of the cost of the concession on fertilisers and lime, as well as the £36,000 additional interest caused by the higher rates on renewal or conversion of loans, and got them down to half a million by deducting the interest formerly payable on the eight million pounds contributed by the Consolidated Fund for the construction of branch lines and now written off. It might be a proper stroke of v the " policy pen " to relieve the Railway Expenditure Account of the proportion of the cost of the freight concession on fertilisers and lime, but it is difficult to see how the railways, if considered as a business undertaking, could be relieved of other items of expenditure without violating sound principles of accountancy. Although tb.e Minister says that the adoption of Canadian bookkeeping would enable the New Zealand railways to make a much better financial showing, he has neither claimed nor shown that the circumstances are comparable. To begin with. 'V railways in Canada are not (•■..; lucted wholly by the State. The Canadian Pacific, as important a line as any in the whole Dominion, is under private ownership, and under the ordinary business necessity of meeting its expenditure from its own revenue.