PAHIATUA.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LVII, Issue 202, 27 July 1937, Page 8

PAHIATUA.

FARM COSTS. Speaking at Pahiatua on Friday night, Mr J. Hodgens. M.P., addressed himself to recent statements made castigating the Government on the point of increases in farm costs in regard to tlie dairy industry. Mr Hodgens said that the outcry made in regard to the increases in farm costs compared with the 1935-36 season was an example of how figures, when presented in a certain way, could be made to appear very terrifying to anyone who did not take the trobuble to analyse them and ascertain just what they meant. Mr Hodgens said that the claim had been made recently in a report by a special committee of the Farmers’ Union that the Government’s legislation had brought about a direct" and large increase in farm costs. The Government meant to rehabilitate the fanner, literally, and any increases in costs for which the Government was responsible were to be taken into consideration by the Mortgage Adjustment Commissions. The chairman of the meeting was Mr G. F. Hoggard, chairman of the Pahiatua branch of the Labour Party, and Mr V. E. Christensen accompanied Mr Hodgens. To present the increases in farm costs as percentages prevented the average person enquiring too closely into their significance, said Mr Hodgens. For instance, if casual labour amounted to £IOO. and it increased in a season to £l5O, that would be serious. If, however, as in the case of the costs statement presented to the public by the special committee of the Farmers’ Union, the increase in casual labour cost was 11s 8d per. 60001 b of butterfat, • one would not be unduly alarmed, although it represented in figures given in the Press an actual increase of 33 1-3 per cent, on the casual wages paid at the present compared with those paid in tho season 1935-36. Continuing, the speaker said : “The basis of the comparison is a unit of labour producing 6001 b butterfat, or in other words, on the assumption that one man will milk cows to this productive capacitv. The total working expenses compared with 1935-36 have, it is stated, increased by £l2 10s which is the difference between the total of season 1935-36 and the estimated increases for this season. This figure, supposing it correct, does not look so bad when you regard it from the point of view of the compensatory effect of tho Mortgagors Rehabilitation Act,” he added. That the guaranteed price for dairy products and the Mortgagors Rehabilitation Act were part and parcel of the Government’s scheme to bring about the farmers’ rehabilitation had been a point made very expressly by the Minister of Finance, Hon. AY.' Nash, said Mr Hodgens. Every farmer was urged to bring his mortgages up for adjustment. Part and parcel of the adjustment was to take into account in the productive statement prepared by and for the Adjustment Commission not only the items mentioned above, but the item of increased wages. It was here that the reason for using the Farmers’ Union by reactionaries came in. When the increase of £SB 17s 6d (which was what the 2.335 d per lb b.f. came to on a 60001 b production) the capitalisation of the property was reduced to the extent of £1177, and the farmer had no longer to pay interest on this amount to the mortgagee. So it was easily seen in this particular case who the interested parties might lie who were connected with the compensator}’ price advocates inside. Not only did the Adjustment Commission take into account .(on the expense side of the productive statement) all the items already mentioned, but it proceeded to take into account the following Further items of expense —herd testing (so much per cow), interest on plant, implements and stock. 5 per cent: management—it allowed the farmer himself, apart from the labour he was emploving, a living wage, no less than the minimum wage prescribed by the Act—and by so doing reduced the capital value of the farm, and reduced the interest lull he had to pay. The productive statement went still further after supplying him with all the manures, etc., a reasonably efficient farmer required for his farm. It capitalised tlie surplus above income and expenditure so calculated at 3 per cent, while the maximum rate at which interest could be charged the farmer on the mortgages adjusted by tlie commission was 43 per cent., thus making the farmer mortgagor a present—in addition to all the benefits already stated —of an interest of one-twentieth in his farm. If his interest was reduced to 41 per cent, the farmer secured an interest in his farm of 3-20ths. As the bulk of mortgages were being fixed between 4J per cent, and per cent, it was easily seen why “reactionaries should band together to use a#y old stick to beat the Government with.”