The Star. TUESDAY, AUGUST 12, 1919. CITY COUNCIL COAL.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 12717, 12 August 1919, Page 4

The Star. TUESDAY, AUGUST 12, 1919. CITY COUNCIL COAL.

Th© decision of the City Council last evening to go permanently into the coal retailing business was amved at after a lively discussion, and by a majority which consisted of the casting vote of the Mayor. It was rather remarkable that after the decision had been reached the council would not take the power to supply itself with the necessary staff. Councillor Nicholls had supported the Mayor and the Labour councillors in their proposals, and it is difficult to understand why he should baulk at the final fence. If the council is to enter the business permanently it ought to have the plant, and it should be able to get the plant without spending a few hundred pounds in an appeal to the ratepayers. The question whether the council should continue in the coal business is a vexed one, and there is room for argument for and against. AVe have expressed the Opinion that the council, in taking up its original proposition, rendered a real service to the community. The public had suffered from high prices and profiteering, and it was not until the council acted that the people who should have protected the public showed any intention of performing that service The council’s spirited intervention brought forth a price list which the leading dealers declared they intended to enforce, by the piocess of withholding supplies from any retailer who exceeded them- The council may not have increased the city’s coal supply—that point is in dispute—but it compelled dealers to bestir themselves and end the shameless profiteering, of the existence of which thy could hardly have been ignorant. The council’s decision to remain permanently in the coal business will not cause any undue excitement, and it cannot bo expected that the public will regard the decision with hostility. We would have preferred the decision to have been in favour of a limited period, during which the council would have been able to form a sounder judgment on the necessity or otherwise of its permanent adoption of the business of coal dealer. The point, however, is not an important one. The council, if it finds that its coal yards perform no useful service, can withdraw at any time. It must be conceded that the existence of a State depot and a municipal depot looks like a surfeit of good things. The service of the State depot, however, is too slow and intermittent. If it could be speeded up, and supplies increased, it would form an effective check on profiteering, and render the establishment of a municipal coal supply unnecessary. At a later date, when the coal question becomes less of a political stalking horse than it is now, the council should review it calmly and dispassionately, in the light of the facts gained by experience. In the meantime, having resolved to run the business, it should take steps to see that it is not run merely to check profiteering, but so that it will not involve the city in financial loss.