FLAXMILLING INDUSTRY.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 323, 9 October 1908, Page 5

FLAXMILLING INDUSTRY.

KILLED BY STATE REGULATION? At 'a conference yesterday of the New Zealand Employers' Federation, Mr. H. Greig. president of the New Ze&'and Flaxmillers' Association, proposed the following resolution:— . . i "That tho present condition of the flaxmillirig industry proves that the State regulation of cost of t production; where the selling price of the product cannot he regulated by; the State or the producer, • is wrong in principle." '• ■ . ■ In the course of an address on the question he emphasised the impotence of compulsory. arbitration to regulate industrial conditions in times of adversity, and said that instead of regulating it killed. The har-. vesting of an acre of flax involved anexpenditure of about £50 to £70 in wages, which was* ten times more per acre annually than was'paid on ; the best farms. As a ,result of the decrease 'of 9000 tons in the flax output from January to August; there . was a loss in wages to mill. workers. of £135,000; the indirect loss to engineers, coalmines, railways, ships, etc., was a. further,'£4s,ooo.. The total loss for a whole year on this basis'.would be; £255,000,.-or over a quarter of a; million;'. It was on account of the high wages made, compulsory under the arbitration laws that'the industry was forced to close down.' The impossibility of maintaining the output and the consequent loss of the fibre'trade of the world \yero serious matters.;/ ■ The motion was carried. ,