Worth £240,000

New Guinea Goods Worth £240,000 Said To Be Stolen

THERE is likely to be a demand at an early date that an official enquiry be made into the allegations that building materials of an estimated value of £240,000 have been misappropriated in New Guinea.

There are so many rumours bearing upon this matter that it is difficult to say which reports have substance and which should be ignored as mere imag ination.

Like the timber lease reports, however, it can be said that there is so much smoke about, relating to these alleged misappropriations, that there is little doubt that there is a fire somewhere.

Ever since the war ended, and count less millions of pounds’ worth of goods were diverted from war purposes and offered to civilians, there have been mis appropriations. Not only in Australia, but in scores of places where Australian dumps had been organised, there was wholesale theft. Thousands of men, in spired by the Australian Government’s readiness to grab anything it could for itself out of the public purse, stole goods unblushingly; and only a comparative few of them were discovered and punished.

In New Guinea, certain elem«nts “made it a welter” and some of them took little trouble to conceal what they were doing.

If ever an investigation is ordered, and the full truth comes out, it will be found that £240,000 is an understatement of the value of goods purloined.