COST OF HOUSES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19405, 13 August 1926, Page 9

COST OF HOUSES.

ERECTIONS AT CANBERRA, "CHEAPER THAN SYDNEY." The chairman of the Australian Federated Capital Commission, Mr. Butters, informed the Federal Public Works Committee lately that tenders which had been called by the commission had shown that houses of similar design to those being erected at Canberra by the commission would, if built in Sydney or Melbourne, cost considerably more than in Canberra. In view of the criticism aroused, said Mr. Butters, tho commission had had tenders called in Sydney and Melbourne, with this result. The tenders indicated that the cost in those cities would be 20 per cent, higher than at Canberra. For type No. 9, which the commission would build for £I3OO. Melbourne tenderers quoted £1525 10s, £1572, £I6OC and £1650. Sydney quotes were £1663, £1660 and £1550. Those figures did not include certain extras covered by an additional £125, included in the commission's scale of charges. Mr. Butters assured the committee that the commission had neither set out nor hoped to make the slightest profit on houses erected for public servants. In January the commission had been informed that instead of accommodation for 160 people, in addition to members of Parliament and the printing staffs, 450 extra people would have to be accommodated. Tho work had had to be speeded up, and contracts for houses were let. The commission, it was stated, was committed to two contracts for the erection of 100 houses each, and another for the erection of not more than 100. The minimum frontages of residential blocks would be 70ft. and the maximum 130 ft. The prices would range from £3 to £8 a foot. The rent of houses was being revised under the new loan conditions. A contract for the erection of 100 concrete cottages had been let, tho average price of each being £1225. The cost of the concrete houses would be the same as similar brick structures. PRODUCTION OF SUGAR. THE QUEENSLAND. ESTIMATE. The director •of sugar experiment stations, Mr. Easterby, stated the other day that the present approximate estimate of this year's manufacture of raw sugar in Queensland was 380,000 tons. This was a considerable reduction in the estimates formed at tho beginning of tho year, and was the result of prolonged dry weather in nearly all the sugar districts of Queensland this year. There had been no regular Wet seasons, and if the dry weather persisted it was quite possible that this estimate would bo still further reduced. COAL AND INDUSTRIES. CONCERN IN SCOTLAND. The possibility of dearer coal in the future has alarmed the steel and iron manufacturers in the west of Scotland. I At a recent meeting they passed the following resolution: —"That this meeting of manufacturers largely interested as consumers of coal, while regretting the present dispute in the coal trade and realising the difficulties of dealing therewith, view with considerable alarm any proposals for a settlement which would result in an increase in the price of coal beyond an economic level. Such proposals, if carried into effect, would jeopardise the maintenance of all industries, like'their own, to which the cost of coal is vital and which have been faced for a number of years with the necessity of reducing costs of production as a condition of survival." ' TARANAKI OILFIELDS. Taranaki Oilfields Ltd., report as follows for the week ending August 7;—East Coast No. 1 Well (Waiapu): Drilled to 1028 ft. in black shale.