RAILWAY FREIGHTS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LII, Issue 16010, 31 August 1915, Page 5

RAILWAY FREIGHTS

PROTEST FROM KAIKOHE.

I A protest against the railway freights I charged on the Opua-Kaikohe section is ; made in a letter received from the busiI ness and farming community of Kaikohe by the president of the Auckland Chamber ,of Commerce, Mr- Robert Burns. | The letter points out that instead of paying lis lOd per ton for wire and staples, as people residing on. similar sections of railway do, the Kaikohe residents have to pay 18s 8d per ton. The rate per ton on grass seed is stated to be double that charged on other sections, a similar state of affairs existing in regard to the freight on bran, pollard, oats and I wheat. The position in regard to case 'goods, the letter maintains, is even worse, the freight being collected on three, four or five times the actual weight. "We fully appreciate the fact that this is not a time to seek a reduction," the letter concludes, " but at the same time we look upon this matter more as a question of being placed on an equal footing with other places." Mr. Rums, in referring to this matter, stated that, in his opinion, it was unfair to charge settlers in a new district such heavy freights. The Department, in deciding upon freights, should not consider the earning power of a small section of the railway but should base its freights on the earning power of the whole of the railways in any particular province.