PETROL SUPPLIES

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23536, 14 January 1942, Page 4

PETROL SUPPLIES

REPRESENTATIONS MADE BY MOTOR TRADE GOVERNMENT URGED TO KEEP TRANSPORT MOBILE (P.A.) WELLINGTON, January 13. A large and representative meeting of the New Zealand Motor Trade Federation, held this afternoon to consider the effect on the motor industry of petrol rationing, decided to take action within the industry along specified linos, with the object of assisting members of the industry to remain in business. In a statement, the federation urges on the Government the urgent need of bringing sufficient stocks of petrol into the Dominion to keep all motor transport—public, commercial, and private —in a slate of mobility and to enable the utmost effort to be put into national production. After recording its desire to assist the Empire war effort to the utmost, the federation states that it was disappointing that when Japan declared war, forward plans had not been completed for the handling of the petrol situation. There was an intensive rush to buy petrol, and this resulted largely from statements that if Japan came into the war the private motorist would not receive any more petrol. The federation compares the position in New Zealand with that in other Dominions. Australia did not disturb the rations issued for private motorists for December and January, the statement said, but staled that it was the intention to alter the position in February. South Africa, where petrol had not been rationed, intimated that it intended to bring in a rationing scheme early this year. Canada stated that petrol would be rationed from April, and the United States had not made any announcement. The basic petrol ration in England for January ranged from four gallons a month for smaller cars to eight gallons a month for bigger cars. It could not be imagined that conditions in New Zealand in regard to petrol could be at any stage more serious than in England since the commencement of the war. “The federation,’*- says the statement, “has absolute faith in the ability of the United States, the Netherlands East Indies, and’ the British navies in keeping our shipping lanes open, and Is of the opinion that both from the standpoint of national defence and the ecoomic production of the Dominion, it is essential that petrol should be made available to keep all motor transport mobile. “The federation is not appealing for petrol for pleasure. The great majority of private rfiotor-cars to-day can be used in assisting the production of the Dominion, and there is no doubt that without motor transport primary, secondary, and munitions production must be slowed down,” the statement concludes.