MATTERS FOR INVESTIGATION.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXVI, Issue 17779, 30 January 1920, Page 4

MATTERS FOR INVESTIGATION.

That the community, pinched as it is by the coal shortage, should be keeping a jealous eye on the largest coal-consuming service of the State is not at all to be wondered at. The maintenance of an efficient railway service is vital to the well-being of all classes, and people who complained so bitterly when the Department found it necessary to seriously curtail the service are not likely to condemn the authorities for endeavouring to avoid a recurrence of the troubles they then had to face. Nevertheless, while nobody wants to see the resumption of a skeleton service there is a feeling abroad that the present circumstances do warrant a measure of curtailment such as would effect a considerable economy in the consumption of coal without seriously affecting the efficiency of the service as a whole. One of otir" leading business men. whose firm necessarily makes extensive use of the railways for the distribution of its merchandise, yesterday ventured the opinion that until the coal difficulty has been overcome all Sunday trains should be cut out. and all city and suburban passenger services reduced to what, he said, might be reasonably regarded as the essential minimum. His contention was that it were better that a certain amount of inconvenience should be imposed on a section of the travelling public than that the existence of essentia] industries should be_ endangered. Speaking on what he claimed to be the best of authority, the same gentleman alleged that .not only had tha Department turned a deaf ear to suggestions of this kind; but that it was itself actually profiteering at the expense of such of our essential industries as it was consenting to dole out supplies to. He said he had good reasons for asserting that in the case of dairy factories the Department was making a profit of £1 per ton on every ton it was selling to them. We cannot vouch for the accuracy of this allegation; but we can say that it was made to us in good faith. Hence we consider it our duty to bring it under the notice of the Minister, so that he may have the matter fully investigated.