WORLD RECORD

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 49, 26 August 1938, Page 8

WORLD RECORD

ROAD SAFETY

DOMINION'S POSITION

MR. SEMPLE'S CLAIM

The claim that New Zealand possessed the lowest road accident rate in the world —8.8 per 10,000 persons—was made by the Minister of Transport (tha Hon.' R. Semple), when speaking at Melrose last evening. Mr. Semple said that New Zealand's roading policy was well to the forefront judged by overseas standards, and pointed out that what had been done in New Zealand had also been done in Germany, a country recognised to possess first-class roads. The Minister said that if the roads \ were not good, then the death-roil must go up. The basis of modern transport with high-powered cars was a safe roading system—good visibility, the cutting out of bends and grades— and in the bringing of the roadway system to the level of that state of efficiency that every country in the world was striving to reach today. Every country of the world was faced with the same problem. The Minister referred to the efficient state of the German roads, and said that the Minister of Marketing (the Hon. W. Nash) had been blackguarded from North Cape to Bluff because he went to Germany. The Opposition said Mr. Nash was in Hitler's waistcoat pocket, and had gone to Germany to get a lesson or two on how to Hitlerise New Zealand. Mr. Nash had gone to try and make a reasonable trade agreement with the German nation because German goods were finding their way into this country. A BRITISH VISIT. Mr. Semple said that a British delegation recently visited Germany to find out the latest about roading, and he would challenge opponents of Labour to say that those people went to Germany for the purpose of "selling out." The British delegation, the report of whose visit he had recently received, numbered 224 persons, and included members of both Houses of Parliament, as well as other prominent people, including some of the most distinguished title-holders of the House of Lords. "Will my friend Mr. Hamilton (Leader of the Opposition) accuse them of going to Germany to sell out?" he asked. "Not on your life he won't. They didn't go to make a trade agreement with Germany as Mr. Nash did, and what Mr. Nash did was logical; they went to learn from the German people. If Mr. Nash had said that he went to learn from Hitler, God knows what they would have said. He succeeded in getting a bargain, and the farmers are not refusing to send their butter there. It just shows the catit and humbug and hypocrisy of the whole business." The Minister said that the British delegation had condemned the English roading system. New Zealand had been doing the very things the British delegation now advocated. He referred to the reasons underlying the taking over by the Government of national highways, and said that Germany had had to do the same thing, but he had not known that till he had read the British report. England had now followed suit and had taken over miles of road. "RUBBER Sf AMP" MINISTER. Mr. Semple said that when he assumed office he found that he was Minister of Transport only in name. "I was a 'rubber stamp Minister;'" he declared. "There were three old gentlemen called the Co-ordination Board, and 36 licensing committees. The three old gentlemen had the right to fix flying fees, and it cost £3000 a year to keep them there, and they were three very wealthy old gentlemen. At that time they were fixing the flying fees between Wellington and Blenheim, and Mr. Meachen (member for Wairau) came to Wellington to protest against the fee, which he said was too high. They took no notice of him, and he came to me. I wasn't allowed into the room with these gentlemen. They didn't talk to me. They were on the 'pig's back.' The powers of the Minister had been handed to them by legislation by the previous Government. They had usurped the powers of Government. I had to be a political jack-in-the-box, answerable to the people for their sins and follies, but I had, no say in doing the job. "I told Mr. Meachen to tell them.not to fix the fee till they had seen me. Sir Stephen Allen, who had been down in the Islands ordering the natives about, said, "The Minister has no right to interfere here,' and there was a paragraph in the 'Evening Post' to that effect. I told my secretary to tell the chairman and his colleagues that I wanted them in my office at 3 o'clock. I told them that I objected to the statement that I should not interfere, and I told them that I, myself, was responsible to the people. The whole board said, 'The Minister never interfered.' I said, 'I want to give you notice that you are not dealing with a Minister who is dead from the chin up.' I said, 'You afe finished. I am introducing legislation next week to get rid of you. Go and finish up and get ready to get out.' And that's where the famous running shoes came from. They art out yet, looking in,, and I am in, looking out. The work I do does not take five or ten minutes a week, and it doesn't' cost the nation a copper, and we paid them £3000 a year. "We had 360 different sets of bylaws, and some were written 45 years ago," continued the Minister. "I have some in my office, and when I have finished I will give them to the museum." He added that there was now one set. . ACCIDENT RATES. The Minister said that today New Zealand had the lowest death and injury rate for road accidents in the world, and he was being congratulated by American and English newspapers. The rate was 8.8 per 10,000 people, and Italy, which had the highest, reached 61,4 per 10,000 people. "As far as the transport system is concerned we have achieved more than any other country on God's earth," he said. Good roads served a threefold purpose—safety, commerce, and defence. He went on to say how defence, and the evolution of transport, had brought construction problems, and said that with modern methods now adopted he had been' able to reduce the cost of construction. The amount of money spent on aerodrome construction when the Government took office was approximately £600,000, which had been spent on the old method of construction. With the new method how adopted by his Department the work that had cost £600,000 could be done iof £200,000, and the nfttion saved £400,000, which had been wasted. There was no boom: the country was just struggling back to normal. The Leader of the Opposition said the Government should not start railways, but the Government had not started railways. Mr. Hamilton's own Government started them. "They borrowed £8,000,000 overseas," he said. "They started eight railways, and finished none, and up to the time we took control £3,500,000 interest had been paid on the £8,000,000 which had been spent. The railways were stopped

in the slump, and now Mr. Hamilton says wait for the slump to finish them." At the conclusion of his remarks, the Minister showed moving pictures Of the Public Work's Department's rehabilitation work in the Esk Valley, and also modern methods of public works construction.

When he entered the hall he was greeted with "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow," and at the conclusion of the meeting he was accorded a unanimous vote of confidence with cheers.