HIGH BUILDING COSTS

NZ Truth, Issue 946, 12 January 1924, Page 7

HIGH BUILDING COSTS

The Reason Thereof A Ring Round The Neck. Minister for Education Parr, returned from a visit to Australia, declared last I week that he saw brick schools being constructed m Melbourne at a cost of over 30 per cent, less than it cost to build schools m either Auckland or "Wellington. He declared further that this difference m cost did not only apply to school buildings, but to other buildings as well. ,So far nobody has ventured to contradict Mr. Parr— for the very good reason that he spoke incontrovertible fact, though when a builder from Queensland Borne months ago told us that we were being robbed m the matter of building costs there was a ....■.' .■ •; -.-.-^ . ; HOWL OF INDIGNATION and (m the principle* that dog- should not bite dog, apparently) the Brisbane Master Builders' Association write to the Auckland Master Builders' Association, stating that it had censured its offending member for having spoken so freely whilst m New Zealand. Since that time, however, the criticism of the visiting builde* has been justified time and again by people who have investigated the cost of building In the Commonwealth and compared it with the cost in' this coun-. try, and there is now no reply to the fact. ■ ■ „.;.. •.:.-. Taking it for granted,, therefore^ that the unfortunate people of New Zealand have to pay from 30 to 60 per cent, more than their Australian brothers and sisters for their school and home buildings, one seeks to discover the reason thereof. The master builders declare that they are making very little profit, that few earn as much as 10 per cent on a Job, and that most of them do not earn as much as the carfoenters to whom they pay 2/6 an hour and fares — or even more. Labor, they say, is not the highest factor m the cost of building by any means, though it is admittedly high. But the price of material continues high, though other commodities have fallen, and there are those m the trade who have no hesitation m declaring that New Zealand is '

CURSED BY A BRICK COMBINE, a timber combine and a foreign combine which keeps up the price of all hardware,, from nails t6 locks. It is no secret tjiat the Government Itself realises' lt Is being robbed (ahd through the Government the taxpayers) by these combines, but it is easier to realise, that It is m the net of the bloodless that! to escape from It — though whether the Mdssey. Administration wishes to escape is ah open question. Whilst on the subject of building, it might be asked what the Minister tor Education intends to do m the matter of brick v. wooden schools? The recent actibh of the Auckland pyrq maniac who burned down two largo wooden schools ho* drawn from the Auckland Education Board a moat emphatic protest ftgainat the proposal to build m wood for the future. The high price ot bricks is the Government argument m favor, of wooden buildings. The way to bust the combine ana to pull down the price of -bricks ifl for the Government to start brick works of Its own— under efficient businesslike management. It could manufacture bricks enough for Its own requirements, anyway, and it could thus obtain- them at about half the prlco charged by the unholy combine which is smiting the people ot this country hip and thigh.