PENNY POSTAGE

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 124, 29 May 1933, Page 5

PENNY POSTAGE

IN "FORCE FOR A YEAR

FLUCTUATIONS IN RATES

Thursday next, Junel, is an anniversary which -will recefive no recognition with flag-wagging :or speech-mak-ing, but nevertheless ft is tho anniversary of an event of; importance to the community ia New Zealand. It was on June 1 last year that penny postage was reintroduced aflter having been in abeyance since Marich of the previous year. ' Postage rates in New, Zealand during tho last eighteen years have fluctuated considerably. Poiiny postage was long the accepted order, and the old and at one time familiar carmine penny stamp, first issued in 1901 and on duty for some twenty years, was supposed to herald universal penny postage. That dream, however, was never quite fulfUled, penny postage being accepted in tho British Empire but; not universally outside it. Penny postage in Kew Zealand and between parts of tho Empire seemed to be an institution almost beyond the realm of challenge, until the Great War came along and upset it as well as many another cherished institution. In September, 1915, there began- a scries of changes in postal rates, and ever since then postal rates have been more or less in a state of fluctuation. : • On September 23, 1915, penny postage was abolished, and l^d became tho rate for the first four ounces. After tho war the Post and Telegraph Department apparently tiidught ad-j ditional revenue was needed, and j could be acquired by "bumping lip the rate to twopence for the first two ounces. This rate was instituted on August 1, 1920, and remained in force until February 1, 1953, when there was a reversion to ljd for two ounces, not for four as previously. Then in October of the same year, with a figurativo flourish of trumpets and the issue of a special penny stamp (the "map" j stamp), penny postage was once again introduced, but it was not the generous penny postage of former years, for only one ounce could be sent for H penny.. From October 1, 1923, to March 1, 1931, penny postage remained in force, but in the meantime the depression had had a demoralising effect, and on the latter date the rates were doubled. This rate, twopence for the first two ounces, and one penny for each additional ounce, remained in force until June 1 last year, when the rate was reduced to one penny again for the first ounce, with an extra halfpenny for each additional ounce. This is tho rate now in force within New Zealand, arid the same rate applies to tho United Kingdom, Britsh possessions, and the United States, except that every ounce after the first costs one penny instead of a halfpenny. The rates for postcards, newspapers, and inland packets, and the late fee j and registration fees have shown similar fluctuation's. It is generally agreed that from a psychological point of view and from tho business aspect penny postage is a good thing to retain whenever possible. Financial considerations, however, must be taken into account. What the future holds in store as regards j New Zealand postal'rates it is hardly I safe to prophesy, but the whole community naturally hopes that this first year of the restoration of penny postage is but the first of many years during which the rate will be maintained. When better times come perhaps we j may be allowed to send two, or even four, ounces for a penny.