MAILS AND WIRELESS

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 84, 10 April 1911, Page 6

MAILS AND WIRELESS

EXPRESSIONS OF APPROVAL. Interesting references to mail contracts and wireless telegraphy ai-e mad© by the council of tho Chamber of Commerce in its annual report. In regard! i to mail services the council remarks :—: — "The most important event under i.his heading since our last report is tins contract which the Government has entered into with tho Union Steamship Company for a service between New Zealand_ and Vancouver. The contract is for five years for a four-weekly service at a subsidy of £20,000. Permission is granted to the contractors to include Sydney or Melbourne in tho running, and to retain any subsidy contributed by the Commonwealth. Tha first voyage from Auckland starts oa tho 4th August, and from Vancouver on the 6th September, and the trip is to occupy not more than 19 days each way, which will give a service to and from London of about 30 days. One important provision in the con. tract is that New Zealand shippers ara to have the first refusal of all spaeo for freight, so long as no subsidy it paid by _ tho Commonwealth, and that no discrimination in rates of freight, passenger accommodation or rates, is to bo made against New Zealand in any, case. This service will not interfere with the weekly mail via Suez, which is running regularly and giving general satisfaction." Regarding wireless telegraphy, the council reports : — "The Government ia keeping abreast of tho times in thaa direction by erecting two high-powe? stations , at Doubtless" Bay and Bluff, with a range of 300 miles, at Gisborne, under all conditions, and four low-power stations for ordinary shipping work, with a rankge of 300 miles, at Gisborne, New Plymouth, Wellington, and" Christchurch; the Tutanekai is aJso fitted up with apparatus. An experimental station has been working at Wellington for some months, and has pirwed a great convenience to shipping. There is no doubt that +'\ese stations, when complete, will be ol considerable Lament + o the snipping community, and will grow greatly n\ importance a-s the practice of having ships trading here fitted with tho neoesjftry installation for I'ecoiving and tra^ismwaijg mebv§i?tt .\ssrewws."