PARLIAMENT.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLIX, Issue 244, 13 September 1929, Page 4

PARLIAMENT.

YESTERDAY’S BUSINESS.

COST OF RAILWAY WORKSHOPS.

Considerable time was spent by the House of Representatives yesterday afternoon discussing 1 the new railway workhere was a long debate on the civil aviation.

shops, while in the evening ' bill for the encouragement o:

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES.

SITTINGS OF A COMMITTEE,

Per Press Association

WELLINGTON, Sept. 12. The House of Representatives met at 2.30 p.m. Mr C. A. Wilkinson asked that leave should he given for the Local Rills committee to meet during the sitting of tire House. Mr E. J. Howard said that he would oppose the request on two grounds. In the first place there was a principle involved, and in the second place, while he was not a member of the committee, there was a question before it in which lie was interested, and at the same time he did not wish to be absent from the House as there were important papers to be considered this afternoon.

Mr J. T. Hogan said it seemed impossible to get through the committee work unless the House reverted to tire old order and left Friday morning free for that purpose. Rt. Hon. J. G. Coates submitted that each case should be judged on its merits and he asked wliat was the reason in this particular case. Hon. G. W. Forbes said that the committee work was very heavy and some of tire committees to meet the situation had arranged to sit between 9 and 10.30 on Friday mornings. Even this did not allow much time. Mr J. McCombs asked that members should be protected by the House from being called to meet during the sitting of the House. Mr It. A. Wright expressed the opinion that in the present case, where witnesses were desirous of returning to Christchurch, it would be desirable to allow the committee to meet. Mr IT. T. Armstrong said that the committee had been unanimous in its decision to seek permission to meet during the sitting of the House. Mr 11. E. Holland said the ]>osition was not due to the new standing orders. Any committee that cared to organise its business and put itself to slight inconvenience should be able to obviate the necessity to meet while the House was in session. He would not oppose the present request as it was not the fault of the witnesses hut the bad management of the committee that was responsible for the present situation. In future, however, lie would oppose such requests except in extreme cases. Mr Wilkinson said that it was entirely wrong to say that the position was created by bad management on the part of the committee which could not know in advance how many witnesses would be appearing before it. The committee in future would sit on two days instead of one per week. A division was called for when the motion was put and Mr Wilkinson's request was granted by 02 votes to 4. MAIL SERVICE SUBSIDY. A return referring to the subsidy paid bv New Zealand towards tire Vancouver mail service was laid before the House. Mr W. D. Lysnar said he thought that the House was entitled to more information in regard to the subsidising of the service. The amount being paid was out of all proportion to the return and could be utilised to much better purpose. The time had passed when steamship lines should 1>" subsidised for mail sendees. He asked the Government to consider both the Vancouver and San Francisco route subsidies,- especially the latter, which went to a foreign country. RAILWAY WORKSHIPS. A return relating to the cost of the railway workshops recently erected in the Dominion was presented. Mr J. S. Fletcher said the new railway workshops had cost £900,000 more than the estimate, which was approximately £1,500,000. Surely something was wrong when the cost exceeded the estimate to such an extent and the Government should institute inquiries into the subject. Mr It, Semple said that, generally speaking, the estimates were a long way out. Surely trained men should be able to give a better estimate of the cost. Mr Hogan asked whether tho Government approved of the centralisation of the workshops. He urged the Minister to give the matter very serious consideration with a view to re-open-ing some of the workshops which had been closed. Mr F. Waite referred to a statement reported to have been made by Sir Joseph Ward that there wero four railway workshops in the country whereas one could do all the work that was required. He added that members who supported the Government should take cognisance of tho Prime Minister’s pronouncements before venturing to criticise. MINISTER’S STATEMENT. The Minister of Railways (Hon. W. B. Taverner) said ho was surprised that at this late hour there were members who were so ignorant of the position of the railway workshops. One would liavo thought that members would be conversant with the whole position in view of the publicity it had been given. Mr Taverner asked members what they would think of a Minister of Railways who abandoned railwav workshops which had cost such a large sum of money. Whether the expenditure was justified or not, only time would prove. He assured the Houso that during the few months that he had been in charge of the department ho had everything possible to form an opinion on the question, but the House would agree that that was not possible within a few weeks. The Prime Minister had been quoted by the member for Clutha as having said that* 0110 workshop would bo sufficient for the whole of tho Dominion, but he did not know that the Prime Minister had ever made such a statement. The allegation had been, mado that the estimates for the work had been exceeded by £500,000. He did not know whether that was a fact, but he could assure tho House that if any members of the service were guilty of such false estimates they would be brought to account. Mr Taverner said he was of opinion that the plans of the late Government wero too ambitious and he thought a better scheme would have been one of progressive development as the need for further facilities dictated. However, once a policy had been laid down it could not be altered. ENGINEERS DEFENDED. Rt. Hon. J. G. Coates said that the ‘ Minister of Railways need not bo

nervous about taking the responsibility lor the new workshops. He would have something that was an asset and not a liability. The engineers who had undertaken tho work were quite capable and their judgment could be trusted. The return which showed that the estimate had been exceeded by £500,000 was mighty misleading. One had to make comparison with the original estimates and to take into consideration credits in connection with the Newmarket aiid Pet-one workshops. Mr Coates said that the policy of distributing heavy repairs all through the country was wrong. The whole question was one of costs of production and it had to be remembered that engine running costs had been considerably reduced. In the old days when an engine had done 20,00 u miles it was sent into the workshops for overhaul, but since the Reform Party had taken charge the mileage ot engines had increased to 70,000 miles. Mr Coates said it had been his duty to oome to a decision on recommendations submitted to him hv his officers and he was convinced that jobs in the workshops were being done cheaper to-day than they had been done under the old organisation. The engineers who had advised the last Government were good enough for the last Government and he ventured to say they would be good enough for the present Government and for a good many Governments to come. He doubted whether there were more highly skilled men with a higher sense of then-respon-sibility anywhere in the world. Mr H R. Jenkins said that n we were still employing officers who had made inaccurate estimates it was iea sonable to suppose they would continue to make mistakes under their masters. He was inclined to believe that we ought to limit our railw Mi C< T St \V Me Do n aid expressed the view that wo were expending too much °¥r ai H ay K VO Holland (Duller) stated that there had been wasteful expenditure in equipment at Eastown (WanNO REASON FOR BITTER ATTACKS Messrs Jones and Hamilton emphasised the necessity for having cfficien workshops in the country, the mtier said that there was no reason for some of the hitter attacks that had been “ Uo'n. T. M. Wilford said it was known to everybody in New Zealand that there had been a waste of inoncj in connection with railway "'orksliops. Mr J. Bitehcncr claimed that the fact that no indication had been given as to who had been responsible tor the authorship of the report that had been read to the House considerably discounted its value. In his opinion the railwav workshops system was a sound one and lie thought the present Minister would be able to utilise it econo-m'i\h-I'G. H. Clinkard said he did not wish to "criticise tho workshops system, but he did want to know whether we were still dependent on officers who had supplied faulty estimates in the past He believed we should be safeguarded against such mistakes in the fU Mr° Fletcher, in reply, stated that ho wanted information in regard to the officers responsible for the estimates for works Which had cost sixty per cent, more than they had inchcatecl. He could not understand wliy the Minister could not have supplied the particulars in relation to the cost of the construction of workshops within a month and he hoped such information would ho made available beforo the presentation of tho Railway Statement so that that statement could bo intelligently discussed. The House adjourned at 5.30 p.m. AVIATION BILL. When the House resumed at 7.30 p.m. the Local Authorities Empowering (Aviation Encouragement) Bill was taken in committee. Replying to Hon. W. Downie Stewart, Hon. T. M. WiJford stated that no racecourses or playing grounds would be licensed as landing places. Precautions would be taken against aeroplanes landing in localities where people were accustomed to congregate. It was regrettablo that tho general public did not realise the danger of approaching a landing machine. It did not seem to bo recognised that an aeroplane could not be pulled up in the same space as a motor car required. Replying to Mr H. M. Ruslnvortli, the Minister stated that no power was embodied in the bill to permit harbour boards granting permission to seaplanes to land on a harbour, but under the present law there was nothing to stand in the way of such permission being granted. The bill under consideration, however, referred only to land machines. LANDING PLACES WANTED. Mr H. E. Holland (Buller) expressed the opinion that the Government should bo empowered to provide landing places in cases in which local authorities could not finance them. Messrs Lysnar and Sullivan protested against local authorities being permitted to give to an authority under tho bill which might bo a private company the right to erect buildings on a reserve and thereby deprivo tho public of tho use of that reserve. Hon. G. W. Forbes said he thought that local bodies could be trusted to act fairly in the matter. Those authorities had never displayed any lack of sense of duty. The idea of the hill was to encourage aviation and in country districts and other places there should bo areas available for landing places. Mr 1). Jones said it was not a matter of lack of trust in tho local bodies. Mistakes might be made which it would he difficult to retrieve. Mr Jones went on to refer to the erection of buildings on reserves, whereupon Mr Wilford pointed out that this clause referred only to landing places. Power was not contained in it to erect buildings on reserves, but only to lease landing places which for a machine the size of the Southern Cross would require an area 800 yards square, but for ordinary smaller machines such as Moths an area of only 450 yards square would be required. Mr Jones remarked that lie thought tho period for which a local body should be empowered to lease a landing place should not exceed the life of that body. Mr Wilford suggested as a compromise that the clause should he amended to provide that a license for a landing place might be terminated

by three months’ notice in writing, lie further pointed out that a license did not involve any power of exclusive possession. No plane could he prevented from landing on an area licensed.

Replying to Mr Holland, Mr Wilford said that aerodromes were already classified as public works. He would have no objection to landing places being included in that classification. Mr Lysnar moved an amendment to the effect that a local authority should not have power to license any reserve affected by a trust or other restriction.

Hon. W. Downie Stewart pointed out that most reserves were affected by some light restriction and it would bo unfortunate if they could not be used as landing places merely because it was provided, for instance, that a picnic should bo held on them once or twice a year. There should he nothing to prevent licenses subject to suitable reservation being granted in such cases.

Mr A. M. Samuel suggested that Mr Wilford’s statement that racecourses and playing grounds could not be licensed as landing places should be embodied in the bill.

Messrs Barnard and Harris urged that provision that a license should not grant the exclusive use of any landing place should be included in the clause. MINISTER’S OFFER.

Mr Wilford said he would bo prepared to include a sub-clause to that effect, providing that where any license to occupy land is granted to any recognised aviation authority every other recognised aviation authority should be entitled to the use of the landing place. He also proposed to include a subclause to provide that every Order inCouncil granting a license for a landing place should be published in the gazette, laid before Parliament and referred for consideration and report to the local bills committee.

A lengthy discussion on the points raised followed until at Mr Wilford’s request consideration of this clause (No. 5) was held over and the remainder of the bill was taken. ADDITIONAL CLAUSES.

Mr Wilford presented two additional clauses. The first provided that any local authority that had established an aerodrome should be given power to make charges to be‘ paid by aviators for the use of the aerodrome and to be paid by the public for admission to tho ground. It also empowered tho local authority to make rules to be observed for conserving the safety of persons using the aerodrome and of the general public and for tho general administration of the aerodrome. The other hdditional clause provided that the Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch city councils should have power to borrow without a poll of the ratepayers a sum not exceeding £500!) for the establishment of aerodromes. It further provided that the Local Government Loans Board should not sanction any proposal to raise such a loan unless it was satisfied that the proposed work could be carried out for a sum not exceeding £SOOO. Mr Wilford stated that £SOOO was a comparatively small amount foi the local bodies mentioned to borrow. It cost the Wellington City Council £IOOO to take a poll of ratepayers and it was to meet a request from that body that the clause had been framed. Messrs J. A. Nash and H. ss. is. Kyle stated that they were opposed to the principle involved in this clause. When these clauses had been adopted, Mr Wilford stated he was prepared to drop clause 5. He did not agree that it was not a good clause, but he wanted to get the bill through so that he would have solve legislation to go on with during the recess. He was given leave to withdraw clause 5 and the bill ao amended was then reported to the House. Tho House rose at 10.30 p.m.