PETROL COSTS

Southland Times, Issue 24420, 28 April 1941, Page 3

PETROL COSTS

To The Editor Sir, —It may interest your readers to learn that during January 1940, 8,193,704 gallons of motor spirit were imported into New Zealand at a cost of £226,489, or approximately 6Jd a gallon. Twelve months later, in January 1941, 2,609,812 gallons were imported at a cost _of £49,336, making the landed cost during this month 4Jd a gallon in New Zealand currency, a reduction of approximately 30 per cent, in landed cost. On March 10, 1941, a reduction of |d a gallon was handed on to the public. Are the oil companies reaping the balance plus cash before delivery? If so, it is high time a further reduction was handed on to the public. In a review of the past year the Petroleum Press Bureau, England, reveals that because of the war the world is consuming less petrol and oil. The demands of the armies, navies, and air forces of the belligerents do not nearly offset the reduction in civilian consumption. Wholesale prices of petrol are the iowest for many years. Before the collapse of France, Western Europe, excluding Germany but including Sweden and Finland, had been importing 15 million tons of oil and oil products a year. Since that time countries have been reduced to dependence on accumulated stocks. There has been severe rationing of civilian supplies not only in Britain and in all countries engaged in or close to the war, but in others far distant.—Yours, etc., MOTORIST. April 24, 1941.