HYDRO-ELECTRICITY.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XLIV, Issue 14040, 24 April 1920, Page 8

HYDRO-ELECTRICITY.

To tho Editor. Sir,—l am pleased to see that M> R..K. Ireland is giving the public, through vour columns, the benefit ot his figures, which have evidently been carefully considered, and I should hfce to enlarge on this position disclosed as it affects the Oamaru Borough. Mr Ireland's figure is a £2,000,000 loan, and I think that this can be reckoned as a conservative estimate, i Starting from this point... we. have ';i probable rate of 3s in the £ on the borough annual value at 5 per cent. | Oainfiru's contribution alone towards j tliis -would amount to the sum of £o80l) per annum. Now. consider the loan,, proposals that would'be'submitted to; the borough ratepayers; they would amount-to these: — . < . 1. You are already supplied with electric current from your own scheme, and; with the extensions already entered into by your local authority,the amount will' probably be sufficient - for ar further five or ten years. .. 2. 'You are already paying for your /own hydro-electricity scheme a rate amounting to approximately -fcloOO to £2OOO per annum, and you will get no relief from this undertaking in the meantime.3. You will, get -no further direct or indirect benefit -until the scheme is completed and North Otago retieuJaied, and this will be a.matter of a good many years. 4i\Xhe keen Dimedin business men who arc promoting the tschemo have not seen fit 'to. urge that their own area should join in supporting the proposition financially. •3. "Will.you give the Board power to Compel you to pay any sum up to £SBOO per annum from now on to some indefinite period? What will be the Borough ratepayers' answer ? . Does not this bear out'my contention that the scheme will probably fall through? The position, then, would be that we are in a power district that has submitted proposal'to the ratepayers, and these have been turned down. . . '■Now, would it not be far better to have an initial scheme that has a,reasonable prospect of financial success, and will hot ■overburden-; tho individual ratepayers? I agajn urge that the Scheme, should be drastically. > altered and its fatal weakness removed, and that the Dunedin area be. included. — I am. etc., R. FINCH. April 24. -