SATURDAY, DECEMBER 22, 1900.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 11923, 22 December 1900, Page 6

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 22, 1900.

The Eastern Extension Telegraph Company will, our cables stated yesterday, redxice its rates on ordinary messages to 3s 6d per word on the first day of - the New Year. There is an obvious connection between this announcement and the fact that Australian Parliaments have been passingBills to authorise the guarantee by their respective Governments of their proportionate share of the cost of construction of the Pacific cable. The Eastern Extension Company has clone all that it possibly could to avert interference, and particularly interference in the shape of competition from a State-owned cable, with a monopoly under which it has been enabled to levy a. high tariff and to reap huge prpfits. It has hitherto had the colonies practically at its mercy. And it has, with a grim determination, struggled to retain its dominant position. Apart from the felt necessity for the construction of an " all-red" cable—a necessity that the company's proposed extension to Australia, of its Cape line, though it will prove of immense convenience now that the relations between. South Africa and these colonies are becoming more intimate than they ever were before, will not meet so satisfactorily as the Pacific cable will—the rates which the company has been charging have been of a character that rendered it desirable that its monopoly should be broken. From 1882 to 1890 the international tariff on ordinary messages was as much as 9s 4d per word. In IS9I it was tentatively reduced to 4s per word,

but the Australian colonies, which received the benefit of the concession, were required to guarantee the company against half the risk of loss; and this arrangement did not last foi* two years before the rates were raised to 4s 9d a word, still with the guarantee. This is the tariff that now obtains, It is the inland charges and the tariff between La Perouse and Wakapuaka that increase the rates in New Zealand to 5s 2d a word. Not until last year did the Eastern Extension Company seem to take the Pacific cable scheme very seriously. And then it imagined that it could strangle the project by its proposal to constrvict the Cape cable, coupled with an offer of reduced rates. It volunteered, at that time, a reduction of the tariff from 4s 9d to 4s, and further concessions on a sliding scale as the traffic responded to the reductions; and, not only that, but it also entirety waived its claim to a renewal of a subsidy of £32,400 and to a guarantee against competition. The Cape cable scheme was avowedly put forward as an alternative to the Pacific proposal, and the company might have succeeded in killing the latter scheme if Canada, Queensland, and New -Zealand had not remained firm. Both schemes are now to be proceeded with, and all the colonies will benefit from their existence. To the commercial community, which most largely uses the cables, the effect of the competition will be decidedly advantageous. The Eastern Extension. Company has already improved on the reductions in the tariff it proposed last year. But a further reduction must come when the Pacific cable is laid, for the suggestion, is that the rate for ordinary messages over it shall be 3s per word, with more favourable terms for Government and press messnges.

It is a hopeful sign that the Marquis of Salisbury, like Lord Rosebery, recognises the, pressing necessity for grappling with the evils of overcrowding in England. Only a few days ago we quoted Lord Kosebery's expression of his conviction that the question of the housing of London's poor was " an Imperial question." And now we have it cabled that the Prime Minister has declared that the existing state of affairs in certain congested centres is a scandal to civilisation. There can be no question that it is a grave scandal to civilisation that in the great heart of the Empire alone there should be nearly half a million peopla whose homes consist of a single room, and who live in conditions that are squalid, insanitary, and even indecent. And with the Marquis of Salisbury's declaration that the country's first duty is to provide adequate and healthful habitations for the poor there will be a large body of agreement. But how is this provision to be made? It is probably with the view of accomplishing! sonwthinp; towards the solution of this social problem thot the London County Council has resolved to promote a Bill for the taxation of ground values. The object which the authors of this proposed step have in view is, of course, to enforce the building of houses on unoccupied areas in the hope that the congestion in existing tenements may thus be relieved. If", has been remarked, however, with a good deal of cogency, that what is wanted is not so much to build houses as to raisa the standard of those who live in them. The attitude of the very people whom it is sought to benefit imposes difficulties in the way of improvement. Overcrowding is not regarded as an evil by the bulk of those who suffer from it. They have no appreciation of the efforts of the reformers who would rescue them from their insanitary surroundings. If adequate accommodation should be provided for them many of them may be depended upon to undo the whole work by taking in lodgers. They will insist upon overcrowding themselves. Until they realise how mischievous and how destructive of both health and morals the squeezing of whole families and of collections of families into dilapidated dens really is, all attempts at the amelioration of their condition will *be completely baffled. But improvement is going on. It may not be rapid, but it is sure. An increasing number of people, it is affirmed, are being educated in one way and another into appreciation of a better way of living. Lord Row-ton has done much by his provision of model lodging houses. Ho, lias shown that it is possible to provide clean, good accommodation and substantial fare for working people in London for half a sovereign a week or less, and out of the profits to pay a dividend of 5 per cent. The success he has achieved has led to the establishment of other buildings conducted on similar principles. And the plan which Lord Row ton has introduced is capable of development. There is 110 reason why houses of the class he has founded should be limited to men: they will be erected yet, probably, for unmarried women, and almost certainly £<>r married men with families. Lord Rosebery has a notion that the creation of working-class centres out of the largo towns would be beneficial. The cablo has not informed us what the Marquis of Salisbury's proposal is, if he sketched one. But if he can effect a muchneeded improvement in the condition of the overcrowded poor of the nation he will have added another to the many claims he has upon the gratitude and esteem of the British people.

It is evident that the year which is drawing rapidly to a close will prove to have been an exceedingly satisfactory one for the Otago Harbour Board. Last year a credit balance of £1090, with which the board entered upon its operations for the twelve mouths, was swelled by the 31st December to a balance of £0989. The ordinary revenue for the year was £05,802, and the -.rdinary expenditure was £03,254. The revenuo was larger and the expenditure less than in the previous year. In the present year, however, an increased expenditure to a somewhat heavy extent has.token place The board has erected additional shed accommodation and has widened some of the wharves. The cost of these works has been entirely defrayed oV. of revenue So satisfactory have been the incomings, however, that, notrithstarding that the expenditure l.as been greater, the board's balance at its bankers' at the present time is larger by £84.66 than it was at the eorresp'^in?; period of last year. It is phin, therefore, that when the accounts are closed on the last day of the year they will show that the credit balance with wßch the year was commenced has bien largely hioroacd. The exact figures -will not; be arsiHble for a few weeks yet, but the information which the Finance Committee was able to present at the meeting of the board on Thursday last warrants us in congratulating that body la

anticipation upon the successful results of the year. And these results are attributable to a cause the existence of which must be a source of general gratification. Tho trade of the port has grown, and is growing, rapidly. Its value Inst year, was £3,162,354, while in the previous year it was £2,570,489. And the increased activity in shipping which the harbour has this year seen justifies the "belief that a considerable advance upon the value of last year's trade will be recorded when the statistics are published. Increased trade, in its turn, implies increased prosperity. The Harbour Board is consequently sharing in the favourable results of the energetic development of the industries of the district. It is itself now, apparently, on the fair road to success. ' It was for years a much-abused body. But now that it has turned the financial corner tho abuse of it has ceased. That is simply an illustration of the working of human nature. It is the institution that is down which is kicked.