COST OF LIVING COMMISSION.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10713, 5 September 1912, Page 3

COST OF LIVING COMMISSION.

MR t>. J.

| The report.of the Cost of Living I Commission has just reached us. From this wo extract tho following evidence given by Donald John Cameron, farmer, of Masterton :

The Chairman: Have you a statement to make? —Just a few remarks. From my expericonce I find no appreciable rise in foodstuffs. Yon can j travel in Wellington or any other part of New Zealand and get a lunch forls., and it has never been cheaper ! than that any years I have travelled. I was on a hospitable Committee, and i the food-costs for forty people were j Gs. per week for food alone, which I seems a very moderate sum. It does not cost me any more to feed my men j than it did years ago; I supply them j with my own mutton. Tho rise of i wages in the last seven or eight years is about 25 per cent. The pay of an ordinary station hand used to be2os. per week but now it is 20s. to 255. and found; ploughmen's wages were 225. 6d., and now they -are 275. 6d. to 305.. The domestic girls are hard to get, and they do not like going into the country; we used to get them for 12s. per week, and now it is 15s. to 20s. Times are good and labour is independent—there is plenty of work for labour. I had a married man and his family, and gave him 355. per week and cottage, his wood, -and milk, and buttor ; But ho only stayed seven weeks, and left because I asked him to load baled hay on the cart. ( Why did ho object to that? —He v.-as engaged to do any work. He said the work was too hard. I asked him who owned the place, he or 1. : It was baled hay, and there was merely one to unload these 80-lb. bales, i Wo have another ploughman just out from Home; we pay him 30s. per i week and found and he is wonderfully pleased with his wages and conditions as. compared with English conditions.

Ho has ,savod all his wages for tho last six months, and put them in the I Fast Office Savings-bank. He will Boon be able to get a farm of his own. j What is the price of farms about your district? —Land is selling high values. There are all sorts—- : £4O per acre sometimes; light land down to £5 per acre—poor country that is. The high vajues are brought about by the skill of the farmer in breeding good stock —that is one main element; the animal cuts more wool than years back —it is his skill in breeding. There are other fanners than sheep-farmers, but they too have to work their land better to get good results nowadays.

Mr Leadley.: Are there any Sedgwick boys in your district? —I think, one or two; I do not know from my own knowledge. I think thero would be openings for a considerable number of ,these boys, mainly amongst the cow-farmers. There are all classes of settlement in my district; the hilly country is in large holdings. Would a more efficient supply of labour tend to much increase production? —Yes, and that would be a benefit to the entire community.

Wpuld that decrease the cost of living? —It should do so, and there would bo an increased amount to export, and that would be a benefit to the community too.