GOODS TRANSPORT

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 142, 17 June 1937, Page 11

GOODS TRANSPORT

GOVERNMENT'S POLICY

FARMERS CONCERNED

SINGLE OWNERSHIP

Goods transport is a question exercising the minds of farmers throughout the country. In an interview today, Mr. W. W. Mulholland, Dominion president of the New Zealand Farmers' Union, commented on aspects of the Government's proposal to acquire certain road services, and asked whether the Government's policy in this matter was to be regarded as the first instalment of the ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange.

It was recognised, said Mr. Mulholland, that the Government's offer to acquire various transport concerns was not a bargaining offer, but an announcement of its intention to acquire these concerns compulsorily.

Transport was of special interest to farmers; it represented quite a considerable proportion of their costs, whatever branch of farming they might be engaged in. Motor goods transport was particularly suitable to small operators or owner-operators, but, operated as a large business, as the Government apparently intended, it lost much of its value and convenience to country people. Its most important characteristic from that point of view was its flexibility, which must disappear when it became part of a large organisation, as in that case it must be governed by rules and regulations. To get the best out of it, it should be free to lend itself to the individual transport problem under consideration. The fact that at present the services which were run in competition with the railways seemed to be the ones which were to be bought out, appeared to indicate that the elimination of this competition was more a matter of the Government's mind than making the best use of the various transport facilities in their , own spheres. ROAD AND RAIL SERVICES. There were many instances, continued Mr. Mulholland, where motor transport could- give a much more efficient service than the railways in the transport of goods, but apparently if it was at all possible for the railways to handle the traffic, or even to handle the traffic part of the way, users were to be forced to use the railway to that extent. In many cases it was uneconomical and had already resulted in users being forced to acquire their own goods transport. Of course, many users were unable to afford the ownership of a truck, and on those the Government's policy might bear hardly.

Incidentally, said Mr. Mulholland, it had been suggested that the Government intended to prevent users from taking advantage of this method of dealing with their own transport, and a statement as to' the Government's policy in this regard was rather anxiously awaited. •

It must be emphasised, he added, that the expropriation of transport concerns was not co-ordination of transport -and did not necessarily have any bearing on co-ordination. Was, therefore, this policy of there being but one owner of transport the first instalment of the ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange?