MONOWAI POWER SCHEME

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21866, 20 August 1936, Page 12

MONOWAI POWER SCHEME

MORE DETAILS BEFORE PARLIAMENT PETITION RECEIVED FROM THE BOARD [From Our Parliamentary Reporter.] WELLINGTON, August 19. Some new details of the situation which has arisen over the Southland Power Board’s loan conversion operations were revealed, in the House of Representatives to-day, when the Minister for Finance, the Hon. W. Nash, was explaining the urgency of the work to be done by the special Select Committee dealing with the board’s affairs. The committee had asked for leave to sit during this afternoon, and the Rt. Hon. G. J. Coates (Nat., Kaipara) claimed that it was unfair that the committee should be called on to work while an important debate on defence was proceeding in the House. The Minister for Finance, the Hon. W. Nash, said the matter was one of some urgency. The underwriters in London had agreed to make available up to August 20 facilities for repayment of the board’s loan, notice of which had already been given. That was why the special committee investigating the petition of the ratepayers to the Government to take over the board’s undertaking had been instructed to report back to the House by to-mor-row. Actually the board should have completed its conversion operation by August 12. the Minister said, but it had failed to do so. The Government had accordingly cabled to London and had received a reply stating that the underwriters would endeavour to quote the same rates up to to-morrow. He personally had been endeavouring to clear up the position for the last seven months.- He had asked the board to appear before the committee to-mor-row, and it was really a question of deciding at the last minute what should be done—whether the board should repay the loan, or whether the Government would accept all responsibility under its guarantee. The chairman of the committee, Mr J. Thorn (Govt. Thames), said the committee had still to hear evidence this afternoon from officials of the Public Works Department and the Treasury. It would meet the board members to-morrow morning and endeavour to report back to the House in the afternoon. . After permission for the committee sitting had been granted, Mr W. A Bodkin (Nat.. Central Otago, on behalf of Mr J. Hargest (Nat., Awarua), presented a petition from the chairman of the power board. Mr J. T. Carswell, and six other members, requesting an extension of the State guarantee of the board’s loan from. 18 to. 25 years, assistance in connexion with the redemption loan, and the supply of power from Waitaki or elsewhere on terms and at prices approximating those obtainable if the board extended the Monowai plant. The petition set out in detail the position of the board’s conversion operations and repeated the argument that an 18-vear term would result in too high a sinking fund. At the suggestion of Mr Nash the petition was referred direct to the special committee dealing with the reto the Government to take over the whole of the board’s undertaking