CARTAGE RATES

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLVIII, Issue 21818, 22 November 1940, Page 9

CARTAGE RATES

Schedule Disallowed Action By Minister By Telegraph—Press Association HAMILTON, November 21. "It is high time the public knew the facts of the matter and that the Minister of Transport knew what the South Auckland carriers think of his decision on the appeal against the South Auckland schedule of cartage rates,” says a statement issued by the South Auckland Council of the Carriers’ Association. “The Minister, the Hon. R. Semple, has apparently repeated his performance by a similar decision on the North Auckland schedule. “For several years the South Auckland carriers have been asking for fixed cartage rates,” the statement continues. “When the proper authority, after hearing the views of all parties, fixes those prices, the Minister declares the rates to be ineffective because the carrying industry did not receive proper notice of the intention to fix prices. The carriers’ organisations deny that they received inadequate notice, and maintain that if there was inadequacy of notice they are quite capable of raising the point themselves without this unexpected solicitude on the part of the Minister. “It must be said in fairness to the Transport Department officials in Auckland that they followed the procedure which had been adopted without question in every other part of New Zealand. It appears that certain farming and dairying groups threatened to attack that procedure in Court or else put the matter right by legislation. The Minister’s duty was to decide whether the prices fixed were too high or too low—not to evade the issue. "The carriers are most alarmed about the whole position,” the statement concludes. “The industry has no political allegiances, but it feels that the Minister of Transport has sacrificed the industry in a political issue between the Government and certain users’ interests. Mr Semple has only himself to thank If hundreds of carriers are now asking themselves who controls transport, the Minister of Transport or the groups of users?”