AUSTRALIAN BUSINESS

Waikato Times, Volume 118, Issue 19765, 21 December 1935, Page 24 (Supplement)

AUSTRALIAN BUSINESS

general improvement. , ADVERSE EFFEOT OF STRIKE. A favourable impression of the state of business in Australia was gained during his visits to Sydney and Melbourne by Mr W. F. Herrick, secretary of, the United Commercial Travellers’ and Warehousemen’s Association of New Zealand recently. Commercial travellers had their fingers on the pulse of business activity, he said, and all he met in Australia considered that there was a definite improvement. Mr Herrick visited Australia to attend the biennial conference of Australian Commercial Travellers’ Association secretaries, this being the first time that New Zealand was invited to participate. The association movement, he found, was very strong in Australia, and its clubs in the two cities were splendid. They were residential, the club in Melbourne, where the Prime Minister (Mr J. A. Lyons) stayed when he visited that city, being very fine indeed. In Sydney the club was being completely remodelled. Of Great Significance. The shipping strike was of greater significance than most New Zealanders —who thought only of the in-ter-colonial boats —realised. On this side of the Tasman people had no idea of the extent of the Australian coastal trade. The very long distances in Australia made carrying by rail too expensive for many classes of goods, and, besides, there was not rolling stock to carry all the seaborne trade in an emergency. The result was that the strike was having a very' serious effect on Christmas trade, and many people who would normally be going on sea voyages as jjart of their Christmas holiday, were not making bookings. A notable effect was on shipping itself. As all Australian shippng was affected, people had to use overseas vessels when they were available. ThL was likely to get them in the habit of using the American vessels where they, were available for the journey between Melbourne and Sydney, and again to New Zealand. This would result in ultimate harm to British shipping. Mr Herrick said he would not give a guide-book description of Melbourne or Sydney—most people knew all the usual things , about these cities—but one or two small facts had attracted his attention. One was that the trams in Melbourne had an advantage over Christchurch trams in having lower steps. Another was the absence of galvanised iron roofs in the better residential parts of Melbourne, and the beauty of the tiled roofs that were popular there.