TOTAL WAR EFFORT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24808, 7 January 1942, Page 6

TOTAL WAR EFFORT

AUSTRALIAN REGULATIONS MANY COMMODITIES "FROZEN" SYDNEY, Jan. 6. ■ Tradesmen's deliveries of almost every kind will disappear under transport rationalisation plans which the Federal Government is about to introduce under the national security regulations. Although they are a wartime measure, they wiil be taken «s a pattern for a peace-time system under which it is hoped to prevent industrial overlapping and waste. The public must be prepared for the inevitable reversion to shop trade. Lack of petrol and scarcity of labour have forced conditions under which it wiil not be possible to make deliveries. More orders are likely to be issued soon preventing or seriously curtailing the civil consumption of many varieties of goods. Mr J. Beasley (Minister of Supply) said the Government was determined not to allow any person's comfort to stand in the way of a total war effort. Orders under national security regulations have already " frozen" many commodities which were formerly used entirely for civilian purposes, and the sale of many others has been placed under strict control. All persons owning sporting binoculars or firearms suitable for military use must give them up to the nation. Civilian revolvers and ammunition have been impressed, and all new tools of trade in the Commonwealth have been placed at the disposal of the Government. The use of aluminium for any but military purposes is forbidden, arid the use of all metals has been placed under strict control. Petrol drums have been impressed, and rigid control placed on -the selling of all stocks of cotton waste and cleaning materials, hessian. hard and soft fibres, raw silk, raw rubber and rubber manufactures, bran bags, woolpacks, cornsacks, wool and cotton textiles, brush bristles, and all industrial chemicals and solvents, including all paints.