BIG POSSIBILITIES

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 1, 2 January 1932, Page 12

BIG POSSIBILITIES

MINISTERS STATEMENT

Last evening statements were made at each YA station on behalf of the Postmaster-General (the Hon. A. Hamilton) and the Broadcasting Board. "For about six years broadcasting in New Zealand has been owned and controlled by the Radio Broadcasting Company," stated the Minister, "and I should like to express apreciation to the company for its successful pioneering of the service. When the company agreed to establish stations some years ago this most recent development of science was then in its infancy. To-day broadcasting is an important part of our social and educational life.

:"A clause in the agreement, under which the company operated, gave the Government the right to take over tho stations at the end of 1931. This the Government by legislation last session decided to do. The prico to be paid is being settled by arbitration. The Post arid Telegraph Department has taken the stations over from the company, arid when the transaction is completed will hand them over to the board, which was recently appointed under the Broadcasting Act of last session.

'For the future the broadcast service will be publicly owned and controlled by the . Broadcasting Board. It will be the aim of the board to, give best possible service commensurate with their financial resources. As the task ahead of the new board is a big one, I would ask all listeners for their sympathetic co-operation. It would seem that unless some further new invention appears that the possibilities ahead of broadcastings both from the educational and social point, of view, are almost unlimited."