“QUITE UNCALLED FOR”

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 786, 5 October 1929, Page 10

“QUITE UNCALLED FOR”

MR STERLING’S REMARKS ABOUT FARMERS PROTEST TO MINISTER from Our Oicn Co-respondent HAMILTON, Friday. -It is disgusting to see such remarks made about farmers, and Mr. Sterling, with his knowledge of the agriculturist, should know better.” declared Mr. R. H. Feisst. of Cambridge, in attacking the General Manager of Railways for his references in his annual report to the farmers’ concessions. Speaking at today's executive meet, ing of the Farmers’ Union, Mr. Feisst said the remarks objected to were; —"The farmers cannot expect continued special benefits from tha railways, unless they are loyal to them, but must recognise the danger of inevitable reaction. . . . Th e railways also afford direct advantages to the farming community by the concessions, such as low rates for agricultural lime and artificial manures, which represent a definite investment by the community in the ventures ot the farming industry.”

Mr. Feisst emphasised that th* farming community received nothing like the concessions of other sections of the public. Mr. Sterling was entirely wrong, because the Railway Department did not make the concessions for lime and manure, but the Agricultural Department. No mention had been made in the report ot the hundreds of concessions and preferential rates made to other sections of the community. "His remarks in any case are entirely uncalled for,” said Mr. T. H. Henderson, president. “It is most unfair of him to speak in that way of the farmers.”

Mr. Feisst added that business people were the greatest transgressors as far as loyalty to the railways was concerned.

It was decided to forward a strong protest to the Minister of Railways,