Compensated Price Campaign

Manawatu Times, Volume 62, Issue 18, 22 January 1937, Page 3

Compensated Price Campaign

Colonel Closey Addresses Rongotea Fanners UNANIMOUS SUPPORT GIVEN. About eighty farmers gathered in the Rongotea hall on Wednesday evening, when Colonel Closey, pursuing his campaign in favour of a scheme of compensated prices, addressed an attentive audience. Mr Roy Craig was in the chair, while Mr N. Campbell, president of the Manawatu provincial executive of the ’Farmers’ Union, was among those present, as was Mr 0. Niedercr, organiser. The speaker considered that New Zealand’s problem was the farmers’ problem, and that that could be expressed in one sentence: “The farmer has to sell on the low world free trade price-level and buy all his requirements on the high New Zealand protective price-level.” He asked his audience to imagine a manufacturer who had always to buy dear and sell low remaining sound. The question might bo asked why there was such a price level in New Zealand. For 50 years tho country had been pursuing a protective policy. It had been trying to build up infant industries and whenever any particular manufacturer had asked for a duty in order to start it had been granted. The Colonel at this stage produced several graphs and drawings which, were placed in a conspicuous place on the screen. One showed the New Zealand wholesale and retail pricelevels and farmers’ returns level from 1914 to 1934, 1000 being tho base for all three lines. The two price levels kept fairly well together and had risen at the end to 1300, whereas tho farmers’ returns had dropped to 800, a wide gap thus having occurred between farming costs and farming income. The New Zealand Farmers’ Union, said Colonel Closey, had fought for 20 years to get the costs down, without success. The things tho farmer needed could be bought in London below the farmers' return level, the tremendous gap tween the English and the New Zealaand prices) being explained by tariffs and other items of taxation.

The speaker produced a graph, whoch showed that motor cars whose landed cost was £2lO bore taxes amounting to £197, the cost of the vehicles thus being almost doubled. That, he said, was where the deadlock occurred. The N.Z. farmer sent two tons of butter to England and received a cheque for £2lO, which bought a car; but when ho came to buy the car in New Zealand he had to pay £430. If a farmer bought a car nowadays ho paid £lO down, £lO the first month —and the balance through the Magistrate’s Court. Motor taxation was not luxury taxation. Farmers who did not want to buy a car might think that it did not concern them, but that charge came upon all classes—the carrier, the grocer, the butcher, the hardware merchant, tho carpenter—and they passed it on in their bills. Tho only person who could not pass it on was the farmer, and he paid every penny of it. As a comparison, the speaker showed that only one forty-seventh of the cost of diamonds was made up by such charges. The speaker said that tariffs were like drug-taking—easy to start but impossible to discontinue. The point was that when companies started propaganda for tariffs, they could spend £1,000,000 on it and add that to the price of the article. The farmers could not do that, and therefore they could not fight those* people who were struggling to hold up tariffs. The substance was that firms in different countries were interlocked. Lots of infant industries in New Zealand w T ero branches of world-wide organisations. The Union’s Appeal

Colonel Closey said that the Farmers’ Union was making tho following appeal: “Abandon the struggle to bring down costs; bring your returns up. Instead of fighting these tariffs, let (Jiem compensate the farmer for that gap.” The farmer’s exports had increased, and his efficiency had increased, but owing to the fact that the level of costs would not come down, he had to pay one half more, on tho average, than he should. They had to remember that it did not matter to them wliat prices wero overseas. They did not get money back for butter; money never left England or New Zealand; world trade consisted of exchange of goods. How was the farmer’s claim regarded by Now Zealand people! The speaker had found a co-operative spirit. The manufacturers who wanted high tariffs, and the trade unions, who wanted high wages, were not resentful of the farmer having compensated price, for they knew that they would benefit in return. The speaker demonstrated with the aid of a drawing the benefit of the increased exchange rate to the farmer. The rate was represented by a box upon which the farmer stood to enable him to hold his chin above the water. “We must guard against any suggestion to take that box away.” Colonel Closey showed, by means of & graph, the proportion of farmable land in New Zealand, the proportion diminishing whenever the farmers’ returns dropped or their costs rose. Land was the only asset New Zealand had, and if they carried on making land unfarmable, New Zealand’s solvency would be impaired. Only one-third of the land was sold; another third, was held by

the Crown, and .the other third was unfarmable. During the last four years 1,000,000 acres had gone back to tho Crown and would not be released. The speaker said that it would be foolish for New Zealand to leave farming for manufacturing. The Dominion’s true job was increasing land settlement, and this was the only cure for unemployment. One of the Dominion’s greatest daugers was in trying to become industrial. If they did not import they could not export. There was no job New Zealanders could do better than farming; there was no job in the world better rewarded than farming; farm products gave wonderful value in goods, tho only thing lacking being that tho farmer could not buy the articles when they arrived in the Dominion. Colonel Closey remarked upon the great progress made throughout the world in mechanising industries, but there was no threat to mechanise farming, and it was the only industry that was not frightened by mechanisation, ho concluded. At the conclusion of the meeting g number of questions opened up many aspects of the case. After a vote of thanks had been carried by acMamation, Mr K. Craig moved and Mr J. Boyce seconded: “That this meeting endorses the claim for compensated prices as outlined by Colonel Closey, and undertakes to help in every way the advancement of ths campaign.” This was carried unanimously.