TOO PATERNAL OIL COMPANY?
SnR,--One of the editors of the Petroleum Times has confessed in a recent issue that in his Review of Middle East Oil he did not succeed in making it clear that a certain oil company is "literally and of sheer necessity" architect, restaurateur, doctor, games-master and priest. He then goes on also to add by implication the roles of fisherman and farmer to the manifold activities of "the company," substituting the padre for the priest. He suggests that if Mr. Philip were to visit Abadan he still might fail to realise the "sheer necessity" of all this ; but I suggest that if Mr. Barber were to live in Abadan he might be less surprised at his failure to make clear his point, because he would himself soon question the validity of any alleged "necessity " which enabled "the company" for which he worked also to control every moment of his leisure hours.
In the early days of exploitation such a " necessity " may well exist, but, surely, one of the first duties of an oil company ought to be to encourage local talent to assume responsibility for some, at any rate, of the non- commercial activities of the community, and not arrogantly to claim for itself the right to have all tell:fingers perpetually in every pie. For instance, why not commission Persian architects and builders to design and erect houses in Abadan, which, in any case, could scarcely possess less aesthetic merit than the villas built by "the company " ; and why not assist Persian restaurateurs to open good hotels in Southern Iran, to provide the excellent cuisine of Tehran and Isfahan as an alternative to the .monotony of imported canned food ?—Yours, &c., DENNIS CRAIG. 21 South Terrace, S.W. 7.
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