9321. By Mr PAYNTER : It appears to me that store keepers get the benefit of the railway to extend their business and they do not contribute much towards the railways? - We pay the freight on prepaid parcels, on drapery especially; on groceries and provisions we do not pay. I think we support the railways considerably.

9322. The drapery is the bigger part of your business?- Undoubtedly.

9323. You send more to the country in drapery than in provisions?- Yes.

9324. Mr HILL : As far as the value of goods is concerned, but not in the freights.

9325. Mr. CLARKSON : Do you ever receive complaints as to freights?

9326. Mr. WILLIAMS : We do occasionally, from customers.

9327. Mr. PAYNTER : You have no instances where the rates are excessive in any particular line?

9328. Mr HILL : I cannot say that I have. The groceries are charged not at the highest rate but at the next highest, flour and potatoes at a very cheap rate; sugar goes as high as the first class rate but not as high as the general groceries. A bag of sugar would go to Wyalcatchem for 3s. 6d., but on to Mt. Marshall the Public Works Department would charge 10s. on top of that.

9329. Mr. WILLIAMS : During the six months ending the 30th April, we paid in freight on country order parcels £1,500; therefore, we do support the railways. For the corresponding period of last year we paid £1,759; which shows that the country trade is not so good now.

9330. By Mr. VENN : Has business increased since the I.A.B. has been in force? When we opened our new place our business increased by one third.

9331. Country orders?- The whole of the house was affected. Therefore it is really no comparison.

9332. Have you given any thought to the agricultural industry in a general way? If you thought it was in a difficult position, what can be done to assist it?- I am an advocate of cheap freights, and I am an advocate of giving the people on the land all business advantages, and I am one of those who would be disposed to put men on the land and give it to them and let them work it out.

9333. By Mr. CLARKSON : You would look on any indirect means, such as cheap freights, as justified, being an indirect subsidy to encourage the development of the country?- Undoubtedly. The cheaper a man can get the freights the better he can live.

                                                (The witness retired.)

                                                                ------

HENRY EVERARD CARDEN STANISTREET, recalled :

9334. By the CHAIRMAN : We have taken the liberty of calling you again, this time to deal with the question of railway freights. We have found during the course of the evidence which we have taken that the settlers describe the freights on small articles such as parts of machinery and single bags of flour as being very high. We expect that this is a question which you have investigated?- The matter has received our attention, but we have also found that a similar state of affairs exists in all parts of the Commonwealth. The railways have a minimum charge which they impose, and if your article should be below the minimum weight they charge the minimum amount.

9335. Have you had any interviews with the department on the subject?- Yes, but they have been of very little use. They have a set of rules under which they operate and beyond which they will not go. Only the other day a man bought a harvester; it was a State implement works machine. He bought it at Quairading and they put it on the rails there and it took three miles, and in some occult manner the railway people threw it off the truck and smashed it. Of course, it was being carried at owner's risk and the unfortunate man had no redress. Owner's risk is a little rule of theirs.

9336. Do you find that it is a feature of State railway management that it is difficult to establish a claim for damage done?- We have not been able to do it yet.

9337. By Mr. CLARKSON : Surely the harvester incident which you have just mentioned must have been due to some negligence?- Yes, but the owner never saw it. He wrote to me about it and I wrote to Mr. Mitchell and asked him if he could do anything. We know that nothing can be done unless the damage was done through malice.

9338. You could recover if you could prove negligence?- I suppose you could, but it is hard to prove negligence. I can give you another instance of timber consigned to Baandee being taken on to Doodlakine, and then being smashed to pieces before reaching Baandee. We could get nothing for that. It might be possible to recover something if we fought them, but it would cost thousands of pounds to do that in order to conduct a test case. The minimum charges to which you have referred are fixed by officers of the department, who have the power to do so, and it is impossible to get beyond them.

9339. By the CHAIRMAN : The only thing this Commission could do would be to gather together specific instances of heavy charges and quote them in the report for the consideration of Parliament?- I have read the leading article in the West Australian this morning, and I think that covers the whole question of railway freights. It is a question of finance, and if you are to finance your railways you must increase the freights. If you cannot increase the freights you must raise revenue by some other method. You must remove the interest and sinking fund, and make it a national charge, and the same thing applies to water supplies and other public conveniences. What we have to do is to make production more seductive, and the only way in which we can do that is to give the man on the land every show. As I have already explained to you, the man in Perth escapes while the man in the country has to pay everything. I think the railway business is the hardest business we have to tackle; but it means more to us than any other. You can give relief to the farming areas much quicker through an alteration of the railway system than you can in any other way. This year we are losing £200,000 on our railway system. The timber trade has gone, and we are going back in other directions, and it is necessary to make that up, and the only way in which we can do it is to add to the freights and fares. Then when you do that you make production harder. As I have suggested, we can collect this money in another way, and then the man on the land is given a chance. All out tinkering