STATE ENTERPRISE.

Evening Star, Issue 14964, 26 August 1912, Page 2

STATE ENTERPRISE.

The Premier of Western Australia (Mr £caddan) last week took the Chamber of Manufactures into his confidence with re*<sr>ect to State, trading enterprise. The Government, he said, were going into thi ilecper manufacturim; business. They had definitely ckfd-a deal with the Federal Government for 720,000 karri sleepers at £65.675, to b& landed at Port, Augusta. The sleepers would he cut in State-owned nulls and transported in State steamers. The Government were, supplying 10,000 jarrah sleepers for the early stages of tho transcontinental line, because it would take time and cost £22,500 to establish a powollising plant. In five yews the Government expected to supply all eastern Australia with sleepers, but at present they had been obliged to re ft: so the Sydney Govemment's requeste for sleeper?- The. Government had not yet started to manufacture agricultural implements, but would forthwith establish meat freezing work* and markets in Perth to reduce the cost of living. The Government had not purchased their steamers for the cattle trade merely. They meant to carry produce outside the State, and eemre ~n import trade from Singapore and Java. The steamer Mongolia, rcchristened the Western Australia, would be engaged in this trade.