THE PACIFIC CABLE.

Evening Post, Volume LX, Issue 114, 10 November 1900, Page 4

THE PACIFIC CABLE.

According to a London cable message published to-day, the Telegraph Construction Company's tender for the Pacific cable amounted jn all to $1,975,000, and the Joint Cable Committee sitting in London unanimously recommends its acceptance. This sum is in excess of the estimates originally made by the Committee's engineers, and it is also £275,000 more than the total cost set forth in the Pacific Cable Authorisation Act of last year. . Our Parliament, however, fully realised that the rise in the price of material, and of gutta percha m particular, would entail a fieavier expenditure than was at first expected. The Pacific Cable Authorisation Act was, therefore, amended last session in the direction of removing the limitation upon the total post. The New Zealand Government }s now empowered to join in the construction of the cable, to raise the necessary money, aud to incur tlie necessary contingent liability^ provided that this colony's share pf the cost and liability does not exceed one-ninth of the -whole. If, as seems probable, the Telegraph Construction Company's . tender is accepted by the various Governments concerned, New Zealand's share of the cost of laying the pable will be about £219,333, which, alJowing three per cent, for interest and sinking fund, would mean an annual liability -of about £6582. This would be the total amount of our liability if the cable only paid working expenses, but there' is every reason to hope that it will do more than that from the outset. The proposal to construct it has already brought the Eastern Extension Company to reason, and from Sir John Barry's remarks at the last meeting of the company, as reported in our cable columns to-day, it is evident that tl^e competition of the Pacific cable will force the Eastern Extension Company to keep down its rates. Thus from the commercial, no less than from the patriotic and strategic points of view, the construction of this new trans-oceanic artery of the Empire is advisable, and we trust that the work will be proceeded with promptly. The Construction Company undertakes to finish laying the cable by tho end of the year after next if it is allowed to start from the New Zealand end, and there should be no difficulty about granting the necessary provision.