TO FIGHT THECOMBINES

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 205, 25 May 1921, Page 8

TO FIGHT THECOMBINES

SHIPPING PROBLEMS OF FARMERS SUGGESTED PRODUCERS’ LINE The shipping problem was dealt with by the president (Mr. AV. J. Polson) 111 his address at the AVellington Provincial Conference of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union, which opened yesterday at Mas. terton. The problem appeared, he said, to present the greatest difficulty, because, firstly, of the high cost of shipping; and, secondly, the enormous power of the shipfTltig combines. He did not think it was. any more vital to have a Government subsidy than Government protection, which would prevent the shipping pool from squeezing the producers out of . the shipping business by a cut-throat freight war. The Best Scheme. After traversing various proposals that had been discussed, Mr. Polson said that the most acceptable scheme seemed to Tie that which involved a levy upon the exporters on the one band and the importers on the other, Hie latter through the Government. The Government would thus assume a partnership in the scheme wita sufficient directors on the board and sufficient control to prevent the company ever being anything but New Zealand owned and managed. As anything in the nature of an import levy would undoubtedly lie passed on to the consumer, and thus be paid by the Dominion as a whole, there was no reason why such a levy should not come oub of the Consolidated Fund. If such a levy brought in a sum of £500,000 per annum from all sources, it would be sufficient to finance the purchase in the usual way of a million, pounds’ worth of shipping per annum, «o that in four or five years New Zealand would have a sufficiently powerful ■ mercantile fleet to actually control freights. Proposed Control. The details of such a scheme raised no difficulties, and if it met with the approval \f the Government it would possess thts advantage, that the whole undertaking would be in the hands of the producers and producing organisations. The Shipping Board would be composed of the nominees of the producers and their organisations in proportion to their interest, and of such Government nominees to watch over the interests of the Government and. the Dominion generally as the Government stipulated for. The Producers’ Committee had the whole matter under consideration, and might be expected in due course to evolve a scheme containing the best points of the various proposals submitted to it. Till by co-operative effort New Zealand had. a Dominion steamship line in sight Giey could expect little relief from the high shipping freights which they had been , forced to agree to for the balance of this season, and the whole of next. Th® decision, therefore, to make the shortest l>os- ■ sible contract at the minimum possible rates would, he felt sure, have tho con- , currence of producers generally.