The Temuka Leader THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1886. THE PRICE OF WHEAT.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1563, 30 September 1886, Page 2

The Temuka Leader THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1886. THE PRICE OF WHEAT.

Wool still continues firm, but wheat has not stirred so far. ibis is the gist of the telegraphic information to band, and to us it ie rather disappointing. We fully expected a rise in the price -of grain in the English market before this, but thotigh we have been getting very good money for it in the Australian colonies for some time past the markets of Europe are as dull as ever. Until this year the price of wheat in this colony was regulated by the English market, but such is not the case at present. Wheat is as dear here now as it is at Home, and it would not pay to ship it. The explanation of this is not difficult to find out. Australian farmers have not grown anything like so much wheat as they used to, and the consequence is that last season’s yield was barely sufficient for our own requirements. So as to keep the wheat from going away millers rushed the market, and hence the reason that prices rose so rapidly. The recent good prices therefore were due. to the short yield, and they cannot be maintained longer than until the local demand is satisfied. This year the ‘high prices have induced farmers to go in extensively for grain growing, and an average crop will leave us a good surplus for export. It .is more than probable that the other colonies will be similarly circumstanced, and that therefore we shall be dependent once more on the London market. If we are right in this supposition the price likely to be realised in the English market next season is of vital importance to us, but it is rather hazardous to give any opinion on the subject. There are wheels within wheels, and rings within rings, working for the special purpose of keeping the price of grain low, bat notwithstanding this,

Ihe best informed'authorities hold that grain will g> up before, long. The Economist, the great financial paper of England, says that the English harvest will yield between two million and three million quarters less than last year, and the American Farmers’ Review, the most reliable authority in the Unit'd States, say that America will be 27.000. obO bushelsshorl. Bsesbnlm’s list says that the quantity which America can spare for export will bo 8.000. quarters less than last year. These estimates, together with the fact that thestocks on hanJ in England and the Continent are ymusually low, have made the soundest authorities come to the conclusion that prices will go up, but not for some time yet. They say that there is no.hope of arise until towards the end of the year, as the harvest is just coming in now at dome, and the market will be stocked for some time to come,~ When, however, • the harvest is gathered in, and it is found that the supply is short, prices will go up. Now this is exactly what will suit us out here in the Australian colonies. Just when the people in England begin to realise that their wheat supply is short, and they are willing to give more money for it,,our harvest will be ready for tb* market,- and We Shall have our reward. This, Information, it will be seen, has been gathered from many sources; it is. l in agreement with opinions expressed by the best authorities on the subject, and it appears to us to be in conformity with common sense. Grain has been selling at a very low [•rice for a long lime now ; it cannot continue so always ; it must take a turn, and we see no reason why it should not move now, when a generally improved tone is observable in most things. We have always held that 1887 would see wheat selling at a good price, and we have every hope that our prognostications will prove correct.

TIRADES UNIONS. The Press s«ys: — “ Trades unionism is thd order of tha day. Everywhere we see the various trades and professions and sections of classes forming associations for the purpose of discussing their prospers and their principles of action, and protecting their interests whenever they are likely to be assailed. The most recentlyformed association of this sort is the Bankers’ Institute of Australasia, which was inaugurated at a meeting held in the Melbourne Athenaeum on the 21st July.” The Press then meanders through a column and a-half of unmitigated rubbish concerning the usefulness of such an institution, and winds up by wishing it a long and successful career. What ft remarkable thing it is that it is very desirable that the banks should combine together to keep up the rate of interest, while it is next door to treason-felony for a few tradesmen or workmen to make an effort to extract from capital fair remuneration for their labor. Readers of the ■'Press will probably remember its condemnation of trades unions not, long ago in connection with the seamen’s and lumpers’ strikes, and on many other occasions, It is, in the eyes of the Press, quite right for monopolists to combine together, so as to uphold their privileges, but for wretched working-men to think of such a thing is monstrous. But there ia a beautiful sentence quoted by the Press from the inaugural speech of Henry Gyles Turner, General Manager of the Commercial Bank of Australia, an! it is so excellent that it deserves wider publicity. It is as fq'lows “ In these bright southern lands, where the fertilising power of the financial rill is better understood than in the Old World, banking is an occupation that will ever play a prominent part in the welfare or otherwise of *he community,”

“ The fertilising power of the financial rill ”is beautiful. The grandeur of the simile is only equalled by the solidity of the information that the fertilising power is better understood here than in the Old Country. And it is so true to life. Bankers know how to make 20 per cent out ®f valueless paper out here better than anywhere else in the world. The Rank of New Zealand, for instance, has a little oyer halt a million of money in its coffers, and its yearly turn over is pretty close on £15,000,000. With half a million of money it turns over nearly £15,000,000, They know how to “fertilise” paper in th*t institution. And then the sapient Mr Turner says that banking will “ play' a prominent part in the'-welfare or otherwise of the community.”’ ;ft ;;bas been playing a prominent fiart in • tin “ otherwise ” direction so Tar, and its “ fertilising power ” has been as withering and as destructive as a Queensland drought, or a Colorado beetle plague. Our banks are sucking the life blood of the colony, and the fertilising influence is felt ouly by their shareholders. Not content with exacting a villainou* rate of interest, they have recently combined together to charge exchange on cheques drawn and payable within the Provincial District of Canterbury, For instance, if a Temuka man obtain a cheque for £1 from a Timaru man, before he can cash it he must pay sixpence exchange, or else go into Timaru and present it at the bank on which it is drawn. No doubt the banks were not satisfied with a dividend of 20 per cent, they think 25 per cent would be better, and they are right so long as they are dealing with sheep that will submit to be shorn by them. But a day of reckoning is at hand, and when the crash names they will not escape unhurt. At any rate, wo think (hat the Press ought to allow that poor working men have as good a right to estab i'h trades unions as bankers, but perhaps that is a question of Uste» 1