A SMUGGLING TRANSACTION.

Otago Witness, Issue 2361, 25 May 1899, Page 11

A SMUGGLING TRANSACTION.

Ona of the " border barbarisms " by which the traffic between Victoria and New South Wales is hampered is the stock tax levied by Victoria. On every sheep which is brought in from New South Wales the tax of 2s is levied.

A case of evasion of the tax on a large scale has just come to light. Mr Albert Terrill, manager for Mr David Mitchell on Gooramadda station, has crossed 25,000 sheep on which he paid no duty. The modus operandi was to pass the sheep through a slip-panel between the bridge and the customs office. The customs officer must have been very blind not to see this operation going on. He has been suspended. Mr David Mitchell is best known to fame as the father of Madame Melba. He is, or rather was, a big contractor, and in addition has gone in for squatting. Mr Terrill, his manager, acquits him of all knowledge of the transaction, declaring that he conducted it entirely on his own account ; consequently he, and not Mr Mitchell, has been fined, the amount being £1000, while Mr Mitchell as the owner of the sheep has to pay the missing duty, amounting to £2500. Mr Mitchell paid immediately, but Mr Terrill has so fai escaped paying the £1000, as he is in the adjoining colony, where the customs cannot reach him in the meantime.

The Maffra Beet Sugar Factory is about to "go bung," to use a slang phrase — or, at any rate, it threatens to do -so very shortly. The Argus state that the output of sugar this season has been so small and the returns from sales so paltry that the company has come almost to the end of its resources. Up to the present time the Government has, by sanction of Parliament, contributed £62,000 -to help the company. The shareholders subscribed £31,000, and ifc is feared that unless measures are adopted for putting the company firmly on its legs, it will totter and fall. Sir George Turner is reluctant to advise Parliament to contribute further, and should he finally decline to propose "a further advance work must cease. The source of the trouble has been ignorance. No one really knew much about beet growing. An expensive factory with elaborate machinery was erected ; but no beet was forthcoming, or at any rate so little that the machinery had long spells of idleness. The farmers who undertook to grow the beet could not make the venture pay, and preferred dairying. The whole thing, therefore, has been a gigantic failure. £90,000 has been spent, and if the company winds up possibly £10,000 may be recovered. The man principally to blame is Mr Allan M'Lean, who was when the company was instituted a member of the Government. Maffra is his district, and, in his eagerness to establish the industry, he bustled the Government into makiftg the big advance. Hereafter beet sugar making will be spoken of as " M'Lean's failure " in this colony.