CABLES AND TELEGRAPHS.

New Zealand Mail, 21 February 1901, Page 23

CABLES AND TELEGRAPHS.

A STATE-OWNED SERVICE. VIEWS OF SIR SANDFORD ' FLEMING. Sir Sandford Fleming has sent a letter to the Hon. William Mulock, Post-master-General for Canada, dated Ottawa, January Ist, in the course of which he says: “Sir, —On the opening of the New Year I beg leave to submit the following remarks on a subject connected with your department. I believe the views expressed will metet with your sympathy and the sympathy of the Government, as • the subject is of great interest, not only to the people of Canada, but- to all other British people. The change of the century is a peculiarly striking epoch to her Majesty’s subjects throughout the world when regarded as coincident with a turning point in the history of the Empire. To-day another British nation enters on its constitutional career, to dominate in another part of the globe, and it seems to me that this is an opportune moment to consider a subject wiij.cn affects Canada in common with Australia. A few weeks ago the Home Government, with th.e Governments of Canada, New South Wales, v Victoria, Queensland and New Zealand, completed a long delayed arrangement by jointly contracting for the establishment of the Pacific cable. This act c.f co-operation involved the adoption of an entirely new principle in connection with ocean cables, that is to say, joint State-ownership. This principle was first mooted in a report on the progress of the Canadian-Pacific Railway, laid before Parliament in 1880. It was proposed by the Canadian delegates at the Colonial Conference of 1887, again at the conference of 1894, and ever since these conferences, in season and °f season, it has been strenuously advocated. It was recommended by the Imperial Cable Committee in its reporfc of 1897. At length the pi’inciple has been adopted, and its adoption is, m my judgment, of far-reaching importance. If closely followed up I am satisfied that the Pacific cable, established as now determined, will prove to be the harbinger of a complete system of Stateowned telegraphs, by label and sea, ramifying throughout the whole British Empire. %At one 1 time the Empire was limited to the British Islands in Europe known as the United Kingdom, but from various causes the flag now flies over vast territories in the four quarters tof the globe. As a rqatter of exact knowledge, the United Kingdom occupies hut a trifle more than one per cent, of the whole superficial area under her Majesty’s rule. An entirely new Empire, consisting of many nations, is steadily being evolved, and we cannot fail to recognise the vital importance of providing the best possible means of bringing each member of the JJriti.sh

family of nations into the closest possible contact with all other members. But as wide seas and oceans intervene the desired end can only be accomplished by means _of the electric wire. The cost of sending a message by telegraph is not, as is generally supposed, governed by distance. It is true that the companies charge according to distances, but this is simply an expedient for obtaining from the telegraphic public larger profits. As a matter of fact, there is pracno more current outlay incurred in transmitting long than in transmitting short-distance messages. It may be contrary to practice, it may not agree with preconceived ideas, but it is a fact nevertheless that there is no known means by which communications may be sent at less actual cost than by telegraph. A mail or a letter cannot be conveyed by railway or ocean steamer without the consumption of coal and expenditure on machinery, on oil, in. wages, and other things to keep the train or ship in motion. The expenditure is constant for every hour and continuous for every mile. The circumstances are entirely different in the case of the telegraph. When once established, equipped with instruments, and manned by operators, messages may be transmitted 100 or 1000 miles with as much ease and at no greater actual

cost than one mile. This remarkable anomaly, added to the equally remarkable although better-known fact, that transmissions by the electric wire are instantaneous, points to a system of State-owned cables and telegraphs as the ideal means of communication for an Empire under such conditions as ours. If it be the case—and it is indisputable—that long-distance messages can be sent at no more actual outlay than short-distance messages, we have happily a means at our command which, if we have the wisdom and forethought to apply it, will greatly tend to unify and consolidate the widely-scattered portions of the Empire. In the determination to establish a trans-Pacific cable from Canada to Australia, the first essential step is now Taken. It should be followed by State cables from Australia across the Indian Ocean to In- *■ dia and to Africa, thence through the Atlantic to the West Indies and to England, as set forth in my letter to Air Chamberlain of October 28th, 1898, and in other documents made public. With our whole telegraph system naionalised as suggested, I do not hesitate to say that messages will be transmitted to and from the most distant British possessions at one-eighth or one-tenth the rate now levied.