SAYINGS BANK YEAR.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20241, 29 April 1929, Page 9

SAYINGS BANK YEAR.

SUCCESS AT NEW PLYMOUTH.

.INCREASE IN DEPOSITS.

[BY. TELEGRAM.*—OWN CORRESPONDENT.] NEW PLYMOUTH, Saturday. A record year was experienced by tho New Plymouth Savings Bank. Tho accounts presented to the annual meeting of trustees showed that deposits amounted to £285,043, compared with £228,620 last year, an increase of £56,423. Withdrawals wero £245,151, being £30,546 in excess of the previous year's figures. The deposits were £39,892 in excess of withdrawals. Tho number of deposits and withdrawals for tho year was 31,521, an increase of 4582. There was a gain of 712 accounts for tho year. The interest credited to depositors and the staff provided fund for the year was £13,024, compared with £11,585 last year. The total balances to depositors increased from £292,026 to £344,774. In congratulating the board and depositors upon tho very sound financial portion, the president, Mr. R. Cock, said safety to depositors had been tho first consideration. They held £40,404 in cash, and in addition held Government securities and Borough Council debentures for £45,000. Their mortgages represented £279,253. All such was invested in tho town and district. The interest on mortgages and investments, not including accrued interest, amounted to £19,880, and tho whole amount had been collected. Mr. Cock claimed that no other institution in New Zealand had its money so satisfactorily invested. The funds in reserve totalled £25,972.

NEWSPAPER, MERGER. APPROVAL IN CHRISTCHURCH [BY TELEGRAPH. —PRESS ASSOCIATION.] CHRISTCHURCH, Saturday. At an extraordinary meeting of shareholders in the Lyttelton Times Company, Limited, proposals for amalgamation with the Brett Printing and. Publishing Company, Auckland, wero agreed to. _ A meeting to confirm the resolution will be held a fortnight hence. POSTAL C.O.D. SYSTEM. NOTICE OF DISCONTINUANCE. At a meeting of the executive of the Canterbury Manufacturers' Association last week a letter was received from the acting-secretary of the Post and Telegraph Department in regard to the Cash on Delivery system. The letter stated " The Government has decided that the svstem is to be discontinued. The agreement with the British Post Office requires 12 months' notice to be given of intention to. discontinue the service. Inquiry is being made with a view to ascertaining whether shorter notice will be accepted." AGRICULTURAL BANK. A VICTORIAN PROPOSAL. The Victorian State Government is considering the establishment of an Agricultural Bank Bill, to finance primary producers. It will be modelled laigelj on the lines of the West Australian Agricultural Bank, and will be separate from the State Savings Bank. It is believed that the proposed bank will have a directorate of tKree, comprising a financial expert as chairman, and two men of wide rural knowledge and sympathies. If the Western Australian plan is followed closely, the bank will make advances up to £2OOO to producers. It has not been made known yet whether an Industries Assistance Board will work in conjunction with the bank, as in Western Australia, to grant advances for the purchase of seed wheat, fertilisers, implements and livestock. GAS IN INDUSTRY. INCREASING USE IN BRITAIN. Mr. Francis W. Goodenough, chairman of the British Commercial Gas ■ Association, read a paper 011 " The Industrial Uses of Gas'' at a meeting of the Institute of Fuel in London recently. Nothing was more striking or interesting in the history of the gas industry in recent years, ho said, than the growth of the use of gas in factories and workshops. In Birmingham, in the year ended March 31, 1928, the total salo of gas for industrial purposes reached the record figure of 2.843,000,000 cubic feet, representing 21 per cent, of the total quantity of gas sold, and seven times the sales for industrial purposes only 17 years before. The first impulse came in the years immediately preceding the war, from the realisation hy manufacturers of the imperative necessity of adopting every means for increasing the efhciency of production in face of intensifying competition. A further impulse was given by the desire of manufacturers to discover means of saving labour, owing, to industrial unrest. The search quickly revealed to many tho inherent advantages of the employment of gaseous fuel in place of solid" fuel. Raw coal had been tolerated so long as fuel for industrial purposes only because they were a very conservative and slow-moving nation. Where new factories were being erected there was also to bo taken into account tho important saving resulting from the fact that largo chimney stacks wera not required where gas was the fuel employed. In fact, tho change from solid fuel to gas in somo of the large existing factories in great industrial cities had occasioned the taking down of many large chimneys and stacks, which only a few years back were emitting almost continuously huge volumes of smoke, which contaminated the atmosphere. Mr. Goodenough gave particulars of some important trades employing gas for their processes, and said his association possessed a list of about 3000 distinct trades in which gas was known to be used for industrial processes—actually for an average of no fewer than seven processes in each. PRODUCE AT PUKEKOHE. [BY TELEGRAPH. —OWN CORRESPONDENT.] PUKEKOHE. Saturday. The Franklin Farmers' Auctioneering Co., Ltd., Pukekohe, report that at the weekly salo at their mart poultry was entered in good numbers and prices were in favour of the vendors, light hens realising Is 9d to 2s 3d, heavier hens 2s 9d to 3s Id, pullets ss, cockerels 2s 6d to 3s 6d, and ducks Is lOd to 2s 6d. In vegetables, which were received in good entries, cabbages brought Is 6d to 2s a dozen, cauliflowers 5s to 8s a dozen, carrots Is to Is 6d a dozen bundles, parsnips Is 2d a dozen bundles, potatoes 2s 6d to 3s 6d a sugar bag, onions 8s to 9s 6d a cwt.. and pumpkins 4s a cwt. Rhubarb sold at 4s a dozen bundles and melons at 4s a cwt. In fruit apples were in good supply and sold freely. Jonathan apples brought 3s to 3s 6d a case, Munro and Parlin's Beauty ss, Delicious 6s, Sharp's Late Red and Northern Spy 6s 6d.

TARANAKI OILFIELDS. Taranaki Oilfields, Limited, report as follows for the week ended April 20Gisborne No. 2 well: Drilled to 2770 ft. in sandy limestono; 6iin diameter casing to 2758 feet. Operations delayed by bad weather; also breakage of 6iin bit joints. Everything now running satisfactorily. Well still perfectly dry.