THE MINISTER AND THE DAIRYMEN.

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 201, 10 September 1937, Page 4

THE MINISTER AND THE DAIRYMEN.

As reported yesterday, the "Speech from the Throne" — really, of course, a Cabinet composition — at yesterday' s opening of the second session of our present Parliament is no more informative than has usually been the case in recent changing years. There is, indeed, in it very little, either with regard to the past or the future, of whicb we had not already been apprised, the Government committing itself to nothing of any moment that had not previously been announced. Iiowever, our Parliamentary correspondent was able to be a good deal more communicative and his lengthy list of new legislative measures to be expected leav.es no doubt as to there being quite sufficient important and, in many cases, controvcrsial work ahead to sustain popular interesl in the proceedings for a good few weeks to come. It has of late been a favourite and frequent boast of the Prime Minister that "nothing will stop us," and, truth to say, it is one that is fairly well justified, for never before in this country has a political leader had so strong a majority of members, each individually bound body and soul to do his bidding, whatever it may be. It may thus be taken that, although there may, doubtless will, be a good deal of pertinent criticism and discussion, whatever Mr Savage and his ministerial colleagues bring forward will 'go," quite regardless of the popular feeling and opinion as, over the last eighteen months, it has developed among the constituencies ostensibly represented by those members. Not one of them dare raise his voice, even in protest. While we may thus await TBe progress of the session with a quite lively, if not anxious, interest, the opportunity may be Laken to have a glance at what the Minister of Finance and of Marketing has recently had to say on the much agitated question of guaranteed prices. Earlier in the week Mr Nash was able to find time to attend a representative meeting of Taranaki dairymen at Stratford. Full reports of what he had to say are now available in our New Plymouth exchanges and in them are items of distinct mterest worth noting! In the first place, the Minister, while stating his readiness to supply the figures — as to-day he purports to do — upon which the Government has worked out its prices for the current producing season, he steadfastly declined to disclose the recommendations on that point ma.de by the committee of experts set up by the Government to advise upon it. The inference is fairTy ciear that the Government's proposals fall considerably short of the committee's suggestions. For this, of course, the Minister may have reasons which he, at any rate, regards as all sufficient. Then we come to what he states as the Government' s opinion of a full reward to the average dairyman for his toil and for his service to the community, which is the fundamental basis of the scheme of guaranteed prices. As to this he puts it down at ios. a'week, of which, however, 30s. is represented by the value of "perquisiles" derived from the farm itself, thus leaving a net return of a bare a week from the commodities arising from 50 to 60, or possibly more, hours of arduous and anxious labour. This is just 13s. qd. less than the Arbitration Court has now awarded as the basic wage for an unskilled town worker, the ordinary labourer, for 40 hours of much less exacting and quite irresponsible work. No more need be said on that aspect of the case. Then, taking another augle, we now have Mr Nash teiling us that, on the assumption that butter and cheese will during this season meet as favourable oversea markets as during last, the guaranteed prices now fixed will involve the Government in a loss of 110 less than ^2-million as against £650, 000 of estimated loss for last season. What, then, is the loss likely to be in a season of slump prices? And, again, what would it be, in such case, were the scheme of guaranteed prices applied, as was originally proposed, to all our exportable primary products? These are questions the taxpayers may well put to themselves. Then 011 the subject of finance the Minister is delightfully vague. Last season's loss of £"650,000 is apparently to stand as a debit on the Government's Dairy lndustry Account with the Reserve Bank "until there is something to pay it off," but whence this "something" is to come is not in any way mdicated. And presumably the same course is to be pursued with respect to all fulure losses, no matter how big they may be. That seemingly is our Finance Minister' s idea as to how this and other schemes are to be worked 011 the "national credit." At length Mr Nash lets us into the secret of the rate of overdraft interest charged agamst thisv Dairy lndustry Account in the Reserve Bank's ledgers. This he now tclls us ls the really nominal rate of i£ per cent., evidently devised to keep the tally of losses down. At the same time the Government is paying 3 and 3^ per cent. for the millions of loan money it is borrowing for other purposes. From this, the conclusion to be reached is that even Mr Nash himself regards money thus raised through manipulation of the Reserve Bank as being worth less than half of that borrowed elsewhere — probably a very liberal estimate.