STEEL WORKS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXVI, 6 January 1936, Page 4

STEEL WORKS

THE ONEKAKA PROJECT STATEMENT'BY MINISTER COMPANY CONFIDENT (By Telegraph—Press Association} CHRISTCHURCH, This Day. Proposals to establish steel works and coal distillation plants and plant for the manufacture of aluminium have been considered at recent conferences held by members of the Labour Cabinet and head of departments,, said the Hon. T. Armstrong, Minister of Employment, in an interview. The proposed steel works, he said, might cost £3,000,000 and employ 1000 men. They would bo situated at Onekaka where there are already extensive iron works. The Pacific Steel Company had already spent some £IO,OOO or £12,600 on prospecting and assay work in the steel manufacture project, said Mr Armstrong, and prospects for the success of the New Zealand steel works seemed good. He had been told that the company was confident that the industry could be made one of the biggest in New Zealand. He had been informed by experts that if the new works provided only half the steel used in New’ Zealand they would justify the capital outlay needed for their construction. Before anything could be done, said Mr Armstrong, something would have to be decided about the part the State should play in the control of the new works. Some interested- persona thought that if it assisted private ,en terprise in such an undertaking, the Unemployment Board should be entitled to shares in the company, and others -with whom he himself agreed thought the Government itself should take over the work.,

Another industry, the possibilties of which were being investigated, was the extraction of by-products from coal, as well as coal distillation for petrol. Success lmd been made of these processes in other countries where the coal available was not nearly so good as in New. Zealand. The flax industry was already receiving Government aid at the rate of £4 for every ton produced, and it v r as possible more might be dono to improve this industry by the Government. -This subsidy at present sufficed to keep many of the mills open. Hemp was at a very low price, but it would be unwise to allow the industry to go out. The Government was assisting at present a Wellington engineer who had invented a new stripper which it was claimed would revolutionise the industry. Another entirely new industry to which thought was being given was the manufacture of aluminium. The Government had been giving more time and thought than had been given in the past to plana for assisting secondary industries, realising that along this course was the only likely solution ov the unemployment problem. A-huge public works programme would only postpone their evil. In the meantime, of course,' the Government would pursue a more active public works policy.