From the Islands Press

WHY should New Zealand’s share of the valuable trade in beer imports to Western Samoa be so small, considering the Treaty of Friendship and the moral obligation to give our trade to New Zealand in return for her banana custom?

The main blame must be on New Zealand for lack of enterprise and promotion. In a few short years Australian beer has built up a wide support from local con sumers, and the Customs Depart ment has seen no reason to favour New Zealand in its ordering. [Only the Government has the right to import liquor into Western Samoa.] Directors of New Zealand’s largest breweries could well be asking whether there is scope in this country for a brewery. The (lion’s or leopard’s) share of £4,000 (the present value of beer imports into Samoa) should be worth investing plant for, and when the present hypocritical attitude to drinking is changed the market for their products could increase enormously.

The change in attitude by the Government can surely not be stalled off for too long. The police force is making an attempt to control home-brewing, but with three houses out of five engaged in brewing the attempt is really futile.

As has been said so often before —it is better to make a good moderate beer available to everybody than to have our people consuming any quantity of dangerous home-brews, or our young men beginning to drink methylated spirits before they are even 21. Editorial in “Samoa Bulletin”, Apia.

I KNOW dirty play does exist in Rugby, but this should be done so that the spectators and the rest of the team do not see it.— Letter from I. N. Wasilosilo in “The Fiji Times”.

IN various ways the Adminis tration appears to be in a haste to increase its revenue before the Budget session begins in September. Water and telegraph charges are the latest and most impressive of these pre-Budget excesses. By raising internal tele gram charges by 30 per cent, and abolishing the lower Press rate

charges (an increase of 300 per cent.) the Administration is setting quite a record . . . Mr. Peckover, Acting Director of Posts and Telegraphs, states that in the seven or eight years since the Hd a word Press rate commenced in the Territory comparatively little use has been made of it. In a matter of about 13 years the number of working journalists in Papua New Guinea has risen from one to 28 and is still continually rising.

But if, as Mr. Peckover states, the usage of the Press rate is so relatively small, why increase it so drastically? It cannot be im portant from the revenue view point. It is simply another decision which puts us out of step with the Commonwealth and the rest of the free world. Editorial in the “South Pacific Post”, Port Moresby.

WOULD residents please note that such items as gauze dressings, sticking plaster, cotton wool and aspirin tablets, will not be issued from the hospital, ex cept when prescribed for an existing condition for which treat ment at home has been recom mended by the patient’s medical attendant. Supplies of simple dressings, aspirin, etc., which may be required for first aid for minor conditions for which medical advice and attention are not necessary, are stocked by local commercial stores. Health Department notice in the “Niue Newsletter”.

I, T. MADHOJI, wish to thank Suman Dayal Sharma (s/o Mr.

G. D. Sharma, editor Shanti Dut), who has found my £65 cash in a wallet and very kindly returned it to me. I really admire his honesty.— Advertisement in “The Fiji Times”.

SAMOANS under bondage in Eastern Samoa are not Ameri can citizens, in fact only nationals and therefore counted as inferiors in American eyes. Other nations too, of course, have been guilty of similar crimes, but as a whole today they are trying to make amends. The US is not.

We make one big mistake here in Western Samoa when we refer to our Eastern area as American

Samoa. At all times we should refer to it as Occupied Samoa.

The assembly should be enlarged to include representatives from Tutuila and Manu’a, and each time the Assembly sits these represent atives should be marked as “absent under duress”.

World and free Samoan opinion will eventually triumph and it will be “Yanqui gone home”. The puppet Assembly in Tutuila is, of course, a farce.— Letter from “Liberty” in “Samoana”, Apia.

THE people of New Zealand are going to find it strange to be dealing with their projected decimal currency, but when it ap pears on Pitcairn it will not cause as much concern because dollars and cents are almost as common as pounds, shillings and pence, either sterling or New Zealand.

The growing emphasis on decimal systems will mean little expense to Pitcarn (a few modi fications to typewriters) and a minor re-appraisal of the school work plan.— Editorial in “Pitcairn Miscellany”.

AN extension of the duty-free list, especially to “luxury” goods not usually, or not frequen tly, bought in Fiji, would bring still greater benefits with no cor responding loss, apparent or real, to the public revenue.

Fur coats, cardigans, fine silver, portable typewriters—these are only some of the things which have been suggested as additions to the list of shopping magnets to attract visitors, and money, to Fiji.

The inexplicable delay in put ting such magnets to work means unnecessarily missed opportunities to add to the prosperity within Fiji. Editorial in “The Fiji Times”.

BY New Zealand’s calendars this was Queen’s Birthday observance, so arrangements were made accordingly, but at the last minute it was realised that this was not the appropriate date for this island, so it was a case of back to public work for the men and back to school for the children and Education Officer.— “Pitcairn Miscellany”.