Report of the British Economic Mission to Australia

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 179824683X

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-182286

Document type:: Monograph

Title:: Report of the British Economic Mission to Australia

Place of publication:: London

Publisher:: His Majesty's Stationery Office

Year of publication:: 7th January 1929

Scope:: 63 S.

Digitisation:: 2022

Collection:: Economics Books

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Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Part II. Main problems

Collection:: Economics Books

15 Causes of anprofitable sxpenditure. Che Murray River Scheme. Australia, a large proportion may have to be written off as lost; or when we are told that of the irrigable land made available by the Murrambidgee Scheme only about one-third is being used for its intended purpose, and that only a fraction of the interest allocable to that one-third is being received, we cannot avoid the apprehension that a very heavy and permanent load is being laid 1pon the community. 20. Among the causes which have led to unprofitable expenditure we are led by much evidence that we have received to believe that an important element is the undertaking of schemes, such as railway schemes, under the pressure of section interests, without due regard to their financial and economic justification, that is fo say, without due regard to the interests of the community as a whole. 21. Further, in some cases where Governments have under- taken schemes of development with the best intentions and motives they have, we believe, undertaken them without adequate pre- liminary investigation and without sufficient use and co-ordination of the expert scientific and technical knowledge which might have been made available to them from the resources of their own departments. We have, for instance, come across cases where an area has been laid out for an irrigation scheme without a preliminary soil survey to make sure of the suitability of the ground for the purposes for which the irrigation has been provided. Again, where schemes have been undertaken which should have mvolved the co-operation of more than one State, as, for example, the scheme involving the use of the waters of the Murray River, they have been started without such co-operation and without a combined survey of the probable markets for the produce which it was contemplated would result from the use of the waters. The authorities concerned, namely, the Governments of New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and the Commonwealth, are indeed now striving in concert with one another to rectify the past; but their difficulties, which are undoubtedly great, would have been less if there had been combined investigation by them all of the possibilities of the scheme and of its probable financial results, in the light of a co-ordination of all the expert and scientific knowledge available to them, before any considerable expenditure was incurred by any of them. . 22. The Murray River Scheme is indeed a good illustration of the causes which have led to much of what we feel to be unsatis- factory in the present position of Australia as regards her public debt. As we understand it, there is at present no intention of proceeding further with the original plan for the construction of locks; and the weirs which have been made are to be used for irrigation purposes, the existing locks serving to allow local river transport to pass between them.

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