Refer to Tables A and B.

These tables show us that during the last six years the [unclear: capital] invested in our railways has apparently increased [unclear: £3,167,589] but out of this sum, as I have shown, £1,955,616 has been [unclear: frittered] away, and consequently capital was only increased £1,201,973.

I shall be told that we have this stock and [unclear: improvements] Possibly we have, but they will soon disappear, and what [unclear: about] the capital then, and what about the stock this expenditure [unclear: has] replaced. Under the heading. "Services to Other [unclear: Depaetments]," column 5, it will be seen that in only two years is [unclear: the] amount of revenue, supposed to be so earned, stated. We may very safely take the other four years at an average of £40,000 per [unclear: annum], which gives another sum of £283,689 of purely imaginary [unclear: re]venue, which went to swell the rate of interest said to have been earned, and which in previous years had not been brought into the account.

Working expenses increased in 1902 more than half a million over 1897, while the increase in gross revenue was only £691,545, or, less the fiction of £283,689 mentioned above, only £407,856, and the loss to the public was £747,110 more in 1902 than it was in 1896. The increase in the number of the employees was 2686, and in the cost of earning each £100, £5 9s.

This is the boasted "Successful Administration," the "Phenomenal Results" achieved by the present Government.

These gentlemen say that the Stage System cannot be tried, because of the great loss it would entail upon the country. I ask is it possible that it could have cost what persistence in the present no-system has cost, and if it did we should have had something for it. Our people and their produce would have been carried cheaply, and we should be free of the charge of wrong-doing, which will be now freely cast upon us.