BEAM COMPETITION

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 11, 14 January 1928, Page 7

BEAM COMPETITION

BENEFIT TO PUBLIC IMPERIAL INTERESTS (United Press Association.—Copyright.) (Received 14th January, 11 a.m.) LONDON, 13th January. Sir Charles Bright, the cable expert, in an article in the "Evening Standard," compares the cable scare over beam wireless competition to the panic of gas shareholders when electricity supply was initiated. He points out that Governments in the early days heavily subsidised cable companies. For instance, Australia paid the Eastern Company £32,400 yearly from 1879 to 1899. Surely it was partly with an eye on future competition that the cable companies built up large reserves. Experience had shown that cable company amalgamations and working agreements were not advantageous to tho public, tending to keep up rates. What was needed, especially from the inter-Imperial trade standpoint, was more British cables and alternative routes and more wireless stations actually competing with them. This should secure the reduction of rates long needed in the interests of the public and more effective Press service between the Mother Country and the Dominions.