BRUCE BAY HARBOUR

Greymouth Evening Star, 15 June 1944, Page 8

BRUCE BAY HARBOUR

GOVERNMENT TO NEGOTIATE

CHRISTCHURCH, June 12

In reply to the request of the South Island local bodies’ executive for increased harbour facilities in South Westland, the Minister of Transport (Mr. O’Brien) has advised the Mayor of Christchurch (Mr. E. H. Andrews), chairman of the executive, that he will be pleased to reopen negotiations with the timber company at Bruce Bay for the purpose of providing harbour works. “I may add that when negotiations were in progress in the past, the timber company was to supply £22,000 towards the establishment of a harbour at Bruce Bay and was to be repaid out of wharfage rates for timber sent over the wharf, but the company demanded another 50,000,000 ft of white pine to be earmarked for the company in addition to supplying the money, which really meant a monopoly of the whole of the white pine of the district,” the Minister’s l letter states. “The Government did not feel inclined to accept this proposal, hence the movement to establish a harbour at Bruce Bay fell through.. As regards Okari<o, it was unfortunate that private enterprise undertook to establish a harbour, as they fell down on the job rather badly. I may point out that there is a possibility of the Okarito forest being tanned by a railway in a few years.”