Readers Write

Northern Advocate, 17 March 1941, Page 4

Readers Write

I regret that in your report of a statement made by me at a Power Board meeting at Dargaville, I am

N.A. POWER BOARD GUARANTEES.

made to say there was a deficiency of

£SO on the guarantees given in the Wairua riding of this county. What I did say was that, while there was a deficiency of only £5, the people of the riding were called on to pay over £152, for which they had received no return, and over £l4B more than the total deficiency in the amount guaranteed. I might say here that the total amount guaranteed in the power board district was £22,673 10/4, while the revenue for the first ten months of the current financial year amounted to £61,871.

| Assuming that the remaining two I months will show as good a return |as the last two months, the revenue ?£or the financial year will be well over ! £75.000 —a return over the whole area i of more than 22A per cent, on the full l reticulation cost, as against 15 per • cent, asked for by the Local Bodies' f Loans Board after giving full consid- " eration to the unpromising nature of I the area at that time. “ I invite not only my colleagues on ! the board —who are, I know, all as anxious to.do. the right thing as I am —but also members of the public, to study the position as it exists today, and consider whether it is reasonable to pick the eyes out of a district first and then charge the people in the outskirts and weaker areas for mere electricity than they use when the total guarantees are much overpaid, especially in view of the fact that the Controller of Electricity. Mr Kissel, is appealing, on behalf of the Government, to power boards and consumers to reduce their consumption to the lowest possible minimum in anticipation of a shortage for essential purposes.

Forcing consumers to purchase power which they do not require, and which is urgently needed elsewhere, is surely not good business under such circumstances. It is also very undesirable that primary producers should pay more for their electricity than the people in the boroughs and town districts.

It is, of course, necessary to continue to take guarantees in the future, as in the past, to provide against possible loss, but, in my opinion, they should be cancelled out of profits in years when large profits are being made.—J. A. S. MACKAY.