LOSS BY FIRE.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LX, Issue 143839, 13 July 1912, Page 7

LOSS BY FIRE.

ADDRESS BY INSURANCE AGENT. At a well-attended meeting of the Insurance Institute, held in the rooms of the Eire Underwriters’ Association Wellington, on Tuesday evening, Mr. F. d. pray read an interesting paper on ‘‘Eire Waste and its Prevention.” In the course, of the paper, Mr. Cray said:— “It is sober fact that the loss by fire in this Dominion is greater per head of the population than in any other part of the world. There are those who will combat this statement by saying that in this country there is such a large proportion, of wooden structures, and pur handful of population is so small that we cannot hope to find our position improve in this respect. To say that the fire waste of New Zealand is ■ equivalent to, say, 10s per head of the population (as a matter of fact it is mote) does not perhaps appeal in any special manner to a large percentage of our colonists, and it is necessary, therefore, to furnish figures, not only of our Dominion fire waste,- but also of older and larger countries, in order to bring clearfr before us what, is being lost year by year. We must bear in mind phot in England, the Continent, and in America, - all of tire best-known fire fighting appliances are brought into ruse, end still we are shocked from time to time with reports of tremendous conflagrations, thus showing that if this young oouptry is to, grow and prosper, and to avoid the great national waste firo, something must bo done by adopting measures that will prevent, rather than by expending large sums of money in attempting to fight our fires. list us estimate the population of New Zealand at, say, 1,000,000. It will bo seen that our annual fire waste at even XOs per head is £600,000. This ram is sufficient to pay interest on 124 millions at 4 per cent. Now, if a loan <h 124 millions were spent in developing our land, this country would be fitted for many more thousands of population, and enormous • advances would be made by payment of £500,000 per annum in interest. What dd we receive for the £600,000 which is annually expended in fire waste? Absolutely nothing. The individual (except in perhaps a few isolated cases) is the poorer, the nation is the poorer, industries and commerce are crippled and hampered, and yet we are doing practically nothing by way of prevention. “Fire waste emanates from two distinct _ sources. First,- the physical qualities of property itself; second, tile moral hazard existing in the owner or Others. This may range from a mere ignorance or indifference to care of the property, or to an active desire to realise from its sale to an insurance company ; or it may exist in the enmity of neighbours, rivals, employees, etc. This moral hazard has never been measured. “The public should bo brought to understand that property destroyed by fire- is gone for ever, and is not replaced by the distribution of insurance, which is a taic collected for the purpose. “A building code should be adopted which will impose type of safe construction. I have in my possession such a code, which is practically unknown in New Zealand. i

“By-laws should be adopted, which will control the use and keeping of inflammable commodities and other special hazards, the storing of refuse, waste packing materials, etc., not only in yards or areas, but also inside the buildings, and we should undertake the enforcement of such by-laws.

i “Regulations are necessary to proride that all buildings where people congregate, such as schoools, factories* theatres, hotels, large emporiums, etc., should be so constructed that the lives of the people may be safeguarded, and that automatic fire extinguishing appliances should be introduced in all large commercial .establishments and city blocks.” . Mr. F. G. Cray was given a hearty vote of thanks for his address.