WHEAT DUTIES

Hokitika Guardian, 25 September 1929, Page 6

WHEAT DUTIES

EVIDENCE BEFORE SELECT COMMITTEE. (By Telegraph—Press Association). WELLINGTON, September 24. A Select Committee of the House, which is considering the question of wheat duties, resumed public sittings to-day. Lengthy evidence was given oh behalf of the millers in favour of the retention of the present sliding scale.

Mr R. Iv. Ireland 1 , giving evidence on. belialf of Distributors Ltd., said ho had been connected with the flourmilling industry, from his youth upward ,and was now Chairman of the Company. During' the past thirty years, they had operated their mills, (a) Under fixed rate’duty; (h) Under Government control; (c) Under the present sliding scale duties. In his opinion, the sliding scale .gave the best results. The policy of New Zealand in the last forty years had leaned toward protection, and it seemed to him that if protection were necessary in any industry at all, an overwhelmingly strong case could be made out for protecting the agricultural industry, the object being to make the Dominion self-supportiqg so far as wheat 'and flour were concerned. Mr Ireland stressed the need of this in times of war, national stress and maritime strikes. It was good business to make New Zealand self-sup-porting as regards food supplies. Wheat lands gave a greater net return than it would if used for other purposes. If New Zealand abandoned wheat growing 'in favour of sheep raising, there would be dislocation of labour. There would be a drift o ( lalvir from the country to the town. Also, most of the flour mill employees would have to be discharged, as undoubtedly f '"r would be imported rather than wheat. Without protection, the aiea devoted to wheat would be greatly reduced. The sliding scale had prevented violent fluctuations in prices and had given a fair price to farmers. Another reason why New Zealand should be self-supporting, as far as wheat was concerned, was the dependence of the dairying, pig, and poultry industries on the Dominion supplies of bran and pollard. Fifty thousand tons of bran and pollard and five thousand tons'" of meal, were manufactured annually, if New Zealand had been dependent bn Australia for these, the duty free of cost would have been £30,000 more. He desired to say, on behalf of New Zealand millers, in reply to statements that they were making undue profits they had no more fear of the restilts of an investigation of their books and profits than they had during the period of 1016 to 1924. It was not correct to say the millers refused to buy wheat from the pool; rather it had been the pool had discouraged the growers to sell wheat. The millers were not antagonistic to the pool, which did not have sufficient control of crops to be a menace.