POLITICAL NOTES.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 964, 3 November 1910, Page 8

POLITICAL NOTES.

— ♦— . A QUESTION OF "FAIRNESS." During his reply yesterday to the criticism levelled at the Aid'te Water Power Works Bill in the Legislative Council, the Hon. Dr. Findlay took strong exception to 'certain remarks made in a sub-leader in The Dominion yesterday in regard to the speech delivered' by the Hon. C. M. Luke on Tuesday. In justification of , Mr. Luke, who could not reply, he said he hnwt say something about an article which he considered to be reckless, bitter, and unfair. The writer, who, had said that Mr.' Luke did not understand the meaning of a load factor, was either a very ignorant' or a. very stupid person, or an unfair critic.. If there was one speech delivered in tho Council on the linos of science, experience, thoroughness, and attention it was Mr. Luke's. He (Dr. Findlay) hoped that for the sake of journalism in this town, a little ■ more fairness would be exhibited in the future. . [Tho following is the passage in The Dominion's editorial that the AttorneyGeneral considers is not " fair :— "Tho Hon. C. M. Luke's attempt to traverse Mr. Jonkinson's able speech was a lamentable performance, and his figures were at times ludicrous, as one example will show. Mr. Jenkinson had claimed that the Prime Minister's estimate of the'cost per horse-power in the Coleridge scheme was too low, and Mr. Luko admitted that it was lower than Mr: Hay's. But, said Mr. Luke, Mr. Hay's estimate was based on a load factor of 100 per cent, (which, by the way, it was not, as such a load factor is physically impossible in actual practice). Mr. Luke added that with a probable load factor of 20 to 30 per cent, a proportionately small quantity of water and smaller outlay on headworks would be required. Mr. Luke evidently has not a notion, of. what 'load factor' means. He seems to think—(l) that the , higher the 'load factor' the higher the cost of production of a unit, and (2) that the smaller the plant the smaller the 'load factor.' As we have already explained, the higher the 'load factor' is the lower is the cost of produotion; while the 'load factor' has no relation to the size of a plant, any more than the ability of a man dopends ■upon his girth." The facts in'' this passage, of course, are undisputed.]