Air Mails

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21707, 14 February 1936, Page 12

Air Mails

The:.encouraging answer given by the Post-master-General (Mr F. Jones) to the deputation * from the Canterbury Chamber of Commerce which asked him for a Dominion air mail service will be received with approval throughout the country. It seems extraordinary that before the present air services were inaugurated some arrangement had hot already been made by the postal authorities to use the services for mail purposes and it is satisfactory to know that the Minister is fully sympathetic and recognises the importance of utilising the swiftest methods' possible for distributing mail both from overseas and within the Dominion. The matter is of particular importance to the South Island, for an air service means a difference of a day in the delivery of letters from Auckland to Christchurch and'two days from Auckland to Dunedin. The delivery by air in New Zealand of air mail from overseas certainly opens up;an interesting and possibly difficult problem for the Pbftt and Telegraph Department to solve, for as the Minister points out, additional expense is involved for the Post Office without any compensating revenue. Similar problems ■have probably arisen in other countries from which guidance may be sought. There is little doubt that once the internal Service is established it will be increasingly used. Business firms and private citizens should be willing to pay a reasonable surcharge (if that is found necessary) for expedition in delivery of their mail, which can possibly be made to compensate for any loss that may be involved from the delivery of overseas mail on which no surcharge can be, made. With the inauguration of the Tasman air service the difficulty of that problem will be accentuated. The Minister has a right to expect, therefore, the full cooperation of the public in using the service to its full capacity. With adequate support it should be possible to provide the cheap and effident service for which the deputation asked. The volume of the mail will no doubt determine, to a large extent, the cost to individual users of the service.