SURPLUS JUBILEE STAMPS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22630, 23 July 1935, Page 6

SURPLUS JUBILEE STAMPS

WHY DESTROY THEM? LITTLE WASTE INVOLVED " Why destroy unsold jubilee stamps? ” is a question which has been put by a number of newspaper correspondents throughout New Zealand, and there has been at least one editorial suggestion that the surplus stocks of silver jubilee stamps should be put up to the highest bidder nt intervals. But the unused jubilee stamps (there is not a large stock of them) will be destroyed, for reasons which will probably be generally appreciated when they are explained. The process does not involve much waste of material, though it avoids a considex-able public loss which would be caused if these stamps were sold at less than their face value. Sufficient jubilee stamps were printed in England to supply the estimated requirements for one month, allowing for the extra demand occasioned by the great public interest taken in this silver jubilee celebration. The stamps were placed on s&le in New Zealand on May 7, and frequent checks were made upon the sales in different parts of the country. When supplies began to run out in some parts of the Dominion simultaneous stocktaking took place, the results being telegraphed to the General Post Office. Certain denominations heavily stocked in some offices were transferred to others where the supply was small, in order to equalise stocks with public demand. By this means it was possible to maintain general sales until June 22 (Coronation Day), when the jubilee stamps were withdrawn after several days’ notice had been given to that effect. So carefully had supply been balanced against demand that in the General Post Office itself only nine stamps of one particular jubilee denomination remained in the bulk stock. However, as 2000 offices throughout the Dominion had had to be supplied with stocks for public sale, there was an inevitable surplus after June 22, and this was returned to the General Post Office to be destroyed. Destruction takes place in an incinerator having a specially designed flue to prevent any of the stamps being forced out into the open air during the process of combustion. An audit officer and a responsible officer of the Post Office conduct an audit of the surplus stamps and personally watch their destruction and give their official certificate. What has been destroyed? To the Post Office so many pieces of paper of very small cost, though if they went into circulation they would immediately command the value denoted upon them, for the reason that the Post Office is prepared to render service to the amount specified. For instance, it will carry a letter across the world for a jubilee Id stamp, or send it very speedily by air mail to the United Kingdom for Is 6d. If surplus stamps were sold to the highest bidder at bargain rates they could bo used to secure these postal services at a cost less than that paid by those members of the public who had not enjoyed the thrill of a bargain sale. New Zealand does not issue stamps for speculative purposes, though the Postal Department showed its interest in the stamp collector to the extent of providing special facilities to obtain muchprized first-cover envelopes of the new pictorial series. The Post Office is only concerned with the use of stamps as denoting the money value of a service it is prepared to render, though it must have regard to the collector to the extent of ensuring that one section is not given an advantage over another through inability to secure a complete issue in one district, while full stocks are still on sale elsewhere. The jubilee stamps were not withdrawn until it was impossible to provide the three denominations at all offices. Withdrawal took place simultaneously at all offices after due notice, and there were no opportunities for speculators. Philatelists, however, can tell many stories of special stamp issues made for their benefit and for the particular profit of sundry small countries of the world. A certain Eastern King who officially opened a new seaport celebrated the event with the issue, for one day only, of an appropriate stamp. There was such a tremendous rush to the only post office at which it was available that people climbed on to the roof, and in the melee two persons were killed and several injured.