Other formats

    TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

The Cyclopedia of New Zealand [Auckland Provincial District]

Industrial

Industrial.

As an industrial province, Auckland probably already stands first in the Colony, and there are indications that it must in time decidedly outstrip all the others. Its delightful climate and many other advantages which the workers are not slow to recognise, keep men in Auckland at wages, which by travelling as far as Wellington, they might increase by from ten to fifty per cent. This statement may seem incredible, but those who doubt it are referred to the Government Year Book for 1898, where the average wages paid in each provincial district during the preceding year are given in about sixty branches of industry. Bricklayers, masons and plasterers are all given as earning eight shillings per day in Auckland and twelve shillings per day in Wellington. Others show lower percentages of variation, but it is quite safe to say that nowhere in New Zealand are the wages so low as in Auckland, and that they average from ten to twenty per cent. less than in any of the other large provinces. This lowness of wages reacts, of course, on the cost of living, so that a working man with a family dependent upon him is generally better off in Auckland than he would be in other parts of the Colony, even from the pounds-shillings-and-pence point of view, while he has, at the same time, the pleasure of living under more enjoyable conditions in other respects. Thus Auckland is in a better position than any other district in the Colony to compete with the outside industrial world, and this is already being made manifest.

The value of the land, buildings and machinery used for industrial purposes in the Auckland Province was in 1898 £1,558,706. The figures for Otago were nearly twenty per cent. less, while Canterbury was twenty-five per cent. and Wellington thirty-five per cent. behind. The provinces of Wellington, Taranaki and Hawke's Bay combined, fall short of Auckland in this connection by about five per cent. In making these comparisons, it must be borne in mind that the valuations are influenced
Gumdiggers' Camp.

Gumdiggers' Camp.

page 30 very largely by the local rates of wages, so that it is fair to assume, that a building valued at a thousand pounds in Auckland is quite equal to one valued elsewhere in the Colony at fifteen per cent. higher. In the number of factories, Auckland led, with 573, Otago being ten per cent., Canterbury twenty-two per cent., and Wellington thirty per cent. behind. In horse-power, however, Otago was first, with Auckland a trifle behind Otago, but thirty per cent. ahead of Canterbury and Wellington, which were much the same. In the number of hands also, Otago led with 5,504 males and 1,551 females, Auckland being second with 5,044 and 1,116 respectively; Canterbury was about two per cent. behind Auckland, the difference being confined to the males, while Wellington was nearly twenty per cent. behind in males and more than fifty per cent. behind in females. In wages, Dunedin paid twelve and a half per cent. more than Auckland to males and over thirty per cent. more to females. Canterbury, with 106 fewer hands than Auckland, paid in 1895 about £5,200 more in wages, and Wellington, though so far behind in the number of hands, was less than ten per cent. behind Auckland in the amount paid to males, but hardly even proportionate in the amount paid to females. In the value of manufactures, Canterbury led, with £2,629,822; Auckland was second with £2,163,759; Otago third with nearly the same; and Wellington was thirty-five per cent. behind Auckland, which was about equal to the other North Island provinces combined.

But while Auckland stands so well in comparison with the other provinces in industrial matters, it is plain that her activity in this sphere does not account for her being so far behind in agricultural and pastoral affairs. For this, there must be other causes, and, in fact, they are not difficult to find, for goldmining and gum-digging are the most prominent.