HARD-WORK CALL

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20017, 16 August 1939, Page 5

HARD-WORK CALL

OUTLOOK FOR FARMER QUERIES BY MR. DOIDGE WHAT IS STATE DOING? PROMISES REGALLED (Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, this day. “What is the Government doing for the farmer?” asked Mr. F. W: Doidge (Nat. Tauranga), when discussing the Budget in the House of Representatives yesterday. He suggested that the document contained no thought for the farmer, except that he should work harder and produce more. When, the Opposition asked what was the Government’s land policy, there was no answer, because it was a trade union Government with no love for the farmer. If its cry was “increased production,” he would ask: “Where is the Minister of Lands?” Of course everyone knew he was jumping in and out of Europe enjoying the spoils of office. If anyone could tell of one item of good he had done at Geneva, it would be surprising. The Government promise regarding the guaranteed price for dairy products, stated Mr. Doidge, was that it should be an agreed price, but he contended that this promise was not kept. Instead the next move in the Government game was a plebiscite blufl'. The Government knew the farmer would be asking for an increased price because of the increased costs, as they were hound to say that they could not carry on with prices mounting up.

“So the Government," he continued, “started the suggestion of a plebiscite and to a large extent that bluff succeeded, with the result that the farmer has been bluffed into quietude.” He suggested that if the Government honoured its pledge of 1935, that the farmer .be paid according to the same measure as other sections of the community, which would include compensation for all costs and a decent living standard, the farmer would be satisfied but the present system was confiscation as against compensation.