TARIFFS OR BOUNTIES?

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 172, 23 July 1929, Page 9

TARIFFS OR BOUNTIES?

FOR SECONDARY INDUSTRIES.

FARMERS' TTNION PLATFORM.

DISCUSSION BY MR. POLSON,

(By Telegraph.—Own Correspondent.) WELLINGTON, this day. Much of Mr. W. J- Poison's presidential address to the New Zealand Farmers' Union Conference to-day was devoted to a discussion of the farmers' attitude toward protective tariffs. Having advocated Imperial Preference and commenced the Canadian Government's proposal that a round-table conterence of the Empire's business men be held, Mr. Poison went on to say:— "We have got to make up our minds that until we can solve our own difficulty and reconcile our members to a policy of the greatest good for the greatest number, Ave will make no headway. We are the victims of circumstances. The fact that a section of our primary producers cannot grow essential crops without some form of protection has been made use of by the manufacturing community to demand protection and more protection, the cost of which is unfailingly piled on to the farmer. We have made a rod for our own backs. The thing to consider is what we are going to do about iU

"Politicians Cannot Settle It." "The first thing to do is to make a thorough investigation of our own position. Is wheat growing essential to this nation, for example, and if it is are we growing the most remunerative wheat fn the cheapest way? If we are not, what must be done to remedy it, and how far will that lessen the necessity for protection? If we are. is there too much spread in our distribution? Are our mills efficient and economical, and are our flour and offals retailed at fair and reasonable prices? No committee 01 politicians busy with the affairs of the country can settle these questions, and no finding by any such committee, however impartial, and however anxious to do the right thing, will get at the root causes and offer a sound and effective solution." After referring at some length to the 1 wheat question Mr. Poison said: "Circumstances have been too strong for the farmers. Some of them —wheat growers, 'maize growers, potato growers, tomato growers, and others—have been forced ' to ask for protection and now that de- ' mand is being made use of as a weapon 1 to bludgeon the whole body of farmers ' who can pass nothing on, having to • accept world paid prices for- their pro- • ducts, while paying through the nose for 1 everything t>ey use by means of the Customs tariff. Protective tariffs, I am ' afraid, are sometimes made use of to • bolster up inefficiency in our secondary industries. .We need secondary in- ' dustries, but they must be efficient ones. To establish them we must first have a sound and successful base of primary industries.

"A Mass of Propaganda." "We have recently had published on behalf of the Manufacturers' Association or the 1928 Committee, or some other body of secondary or financial propagandists, a mass of literature all with one object—more protection. One gentleman has gone so far as to describe his proposal to enforce the purchase of New Zealand made goods exclusively by Legislative means as 'the modern economic solution,' and his pamphlet gravely setting forth this 'plan' has been broadcasted from one end of the Dominion to the other. These things would be ludicrous if it were not necessary to take thejn seriously. Many thousands of people who do not investigate these questions for themselves take such arguments at their face value. "The remedy we seek to apply is along the lines indicated in our political platform, unanimously adopted by this conference last year, a proper practical and scientifically qualified tribunal created from specially selected men of the quality of the men whose report has been prepared for the guidance of the Commonwealth, ana to whom shall be given the task, quite apart from the hurly burly of party politics, of ascertaining what are the essential industries of the Dominion, the order in which they shall be developed, whether that de"velopment shall be assisted by protection or otherwise, and if so whether that assistance shall be temporary and permanent, and, most important, whether it shall be by way of fiscal taxation or bounty."