A MONOPOLY FEARED.

Press, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20622, 11 August 1932, Page 8

A MONOPOLY FEARED.

TRANSPORT POLICY. NEED FOR REDUCTION OP FREIGHTS. "There is a- gnawing feeling throughout the country that the Transport Board in conjunction with the Eailway Department ia laying down ft policy which will result in the creation of a virtual monopoly of transport in the hands of the Eailway Department," said Mr E. Hay, in his presidential address' before the annual meeting of the Canterbury Sheepowners' Union last night. Mr Hay urged that rates of freights on live stock and produce must be adjusted to farmers' present conditions. "Our' Federation in conjunction with the Meat Producers' Board has recently made strong representations to the Government on the urgent necessity for freights on live stock, etc., to be reduced to somewhere near a parity with the drop in values,"., sftid Mr Hay. Letters have been Written setting out the position, and a deputation from the two bodies waited on the Minister at the end of Juty last, and stressed the anomalies arising under present conditions and the need for a reduction in freights to somewhere near pre-war figures. Bail ways' Attitude. "Unfortunately, the Eailway Department appears to ignore the inability of producers to pay 50 per cent, more than pre-war rates of freight, with prime lamb selling on Smithfield at sd a lb today, as compared with Is on the same market five or six years ago. The fact is that we cannot possibly grow a sufficient number of fat lambs at present prices to continue to pay exorbitant rates for services imposed on us throughout the Dominion. "A speedy adjustment is vital to the welfare of the whole community, and we cannot go on paying three or four pounds of wool for a service which four or five fears ago required only one pound. I understand the Minister has promised to go into the whole question of freight rates with the heads of the Departments concerned, and' I ean only express the hope that ability to pay will be the basis of their discussions, and not the monetary requirements to the particnlar Departments concerned." Farmer's Complaint. A similar complaint was received by the meeting in a letter from Mr 8. 7<l. Deans. Asking that the union should take up the case in the interest of a great number of pastoralists who, liks. himself, lived at some distance from the railway, Mr Deans called attention to the Government's threat that it would refuse to give licenses to carters of stock by road, and also to the law by which stock could,not be carted "by road on Sundays. He described his own position at length, and told how a, carter who had carted stock for him on a Sunday had been brought before the Magistrate's Court, and told that his offence was exactly similar to that of a man who carted furniture in town on a Sunday. "I think," he went on, "that jnost of us want to support the railways, "to the best of our ability—after all, we are all indirectly shareholders of the concern—but when fat sheep are to be handled, there must be many farmers who agree with me that the lorry.'is the solution, so far si carting fat stock I from the more remote "farms is concerned. • In fact, it is the only way in which we can get payable results—ah extra 2s 6d per he,ad for our lanUm makes an appreciable differthee in these hard times." Mr D. W. Westenra said he was sure the Government would do the best it could, and that legislation would be brought down allowing transport of this kind where it wan not in competition with the railways. The matter was left in the Sands of the union and the federation. The secretary (Mr W. H. Nicholson) was instructed to look into the law on the cartage of stock" on Sundays.