EXPENDITURE ON ROLLING STOCK.

Lyttelton Times, Volume LIX, Issue 6870, 7 March 1883, Page 6

EXPENDITURE ON ROLLING STOCK.

TO THE HDITOB. Sis,—ln writing on the above subject; I may state that I am partly ignorant of it, as I have never seen the expenditure list of rolling stock for the Government Railways. It must coat some thousands a year to supply engines, carriages, and trucks to fill the places of those worn oat and the increasing traffic year by year, and I would like to see the amount of money that has been sent out of the Colony for roiling stock alone during the pass tea years Mr Editor, perhaps you could inform us how it is that the Government does not keep the money In the Colony (or perhaps Major Atkinson may, a* the work on the rolling stock would keep a few families out of poverty, and that would be a mite to hi* great question). Is it because manufacturing in the Colony is too expensive P lam certain it cannot be because there are no shops in the Colony to do the work, as a walk through Anderson's Foundry, Christohuroh, the Lion Foundry, Wellington, or the ‘Vulcan Foundry, Dunedin, would dispel that delusion from anyone’s mind. I am surprised that the matter ha* not been taken up by the masters and men, m it affects both, and is beside* a disgrace to the Colony to see the money sent away year by year that would help to build the fame of Now Zealand. Supposing that the cost of tbs article wm 25 per cent more; 1 think the Government would be richer at the end of ten years than by sending Home for it; and, betides, it would Induce capitalists from England and America to come and settle amongst us, who are living at the present time on New Zealand money. Hoping that you will insert the above, and thanking you for the space.—l am, A*-, _____ LOCAL INDUSTRY.