Electricity as State Monopoly

Manawatu Times, Volume 61, Issue 65, 18 March 1936, Page 5

Electricity as State Monopoly

Minister's Straight Talk to 'Power Board 3» Per Press Association. INVERCARGILL, Last Night. The ultimate nationalisation of tho electric supply undertakings in New Zealand is the aim of the Government, according to the Minister of Public Works, Hon. R. Semple, who spoke on the subject at a conference which he and the Minister of Finance (Hon. W. Nash) had with members of the Southland Electric Power Board to-day. Mr. Semple’s remarks were made after the board’s decision to reject the Government’s offer to take over the scheme and sell power to the board had been made known to the Ministers. “1 am exceedingly sorry that the board had not accepted one of the two proposals both of which, in my own view, were very liberal,” said Mr. Semple. “These offers cannot be made again. We have these troubles all over New Zealand and are determined to put the electrical undertakings in this country on a sound footing. Wc have £14,000,000 of the people’s money invested in them and that cannot be endangered. ' Yet efforts arc frequently made by local bodies and others! toLjuidermine the State enterprises and there is ruinous*and unnecessary competition in several areas with people paying twice for the same service offered by competing interests. Of this wc do not approve. It is wasteful and uneconomic. There is needless duplication, ruinous overhead wastage and constant overlapping. “ We shall have ultimately to consider taking over the whole supply of electric energy and managing it on a national basis with the double purpose of protecting the money invested by the people in their own State undertakings and reducing charges for current so that the poorest may have the use of it. That is our ultimate aim and I am satisfied that we cannot, achieve it under the present system in process. “Your scheme must sooner or later come in with, the rest and you will not again have an offer such as we are making to-day and its acceptance must work out to the advantage «£ consumers in this locality. “This problem of nationalisation is one which must be tackled some day to save the people from themselves. No Government could allow such suicidal tactics as those at present adopted, to continue without an effort to make an improvement and this Government will make that effort —to rationalise distribution and cut down costs. t “I can’t see any way to do this except by making the supply and sale of electricity a national monopoly. It will take time—perhaps a number of years—and we may not complete it, but we shall start.”