Overseas Flight BOOKED FARES ADJUSTED

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31542, 2 December 1967, Page 1

Overseas Flight BOOKED FARES ADJUSTED

(New Zealand Press Association)

NEW PLYMOUTH, December 1. Direct intervention by the Minister of Civil Aviation (Mr Gordon) has eased the minds of 11 New Plymouth secondary school pupils who, before devaluation, had booked to fly to their overseas homes for Christmas.

The pupils, all from the New Plymouth Girls’ High School, have their headmistress. Miss A. R. Allum, to thank for the Minister’s intervention.

The Minister has assured Miss Allum that all the girls will get to their destinations even if the additional money required for fares after devaluation is not paid before they leave. A Form TV student at the school, Pauline Bowles, who is booked to fly to England for these holidays, would have been in a particularly embarrassing position without the Minister’s intervention. Her parents are on their way to England by sea.

Miss Allum said today she had been approached by the airline concerned and it was obvious the Minister had acted on Pauline's behalf. Miss Allum feels particularly strongly about fares

being increased after all arrangements have been made for overseas trips. “It is the height of stupidity that the airways have not taken advantage of the best publicity they could have possibly had,” she said. Miss Allum felt it would have cost no more to meet this obligation to the people concerned, as a public relations gesture, than to raise the fates immediately.

“It is a gross injustice,” said Miss Allum. She added that she raised with the Minister the moral aspect of the situation.