DAIRY COMPANY REPLIES

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22268, 6 December 1937, Page 15

DAIRY COMPANY REPLIES

CRITICISM OP GRADING AND WEIGHING CREAM SUPPLIES IN SOUTH CANTERBURY Complaints frpm South Canterbury about the non-payment of a bonus to non-shareholder suppliers and about grading and alleged short weighing of cream, which the Minister for Agriculture (the Hon. W. Lee Martin) has promised to investigate, were answered yesterday by Mr L. R. Clarke, general manager of the Ashburton Co-opera-tive Dairy Factory Company, Ltd., which has handled the cream supplies in South Canterbury since the zoning scheme was put into effect. Mr T. D. Burnett, M.P., referred the complaints to the Minister, and also raised the topic in Parliament. “The Executive Commission of

Agriculture has entrusted to the Ashburton company the consolidation of cream supplies in South Canterbury under one company in the interests of economy, which must, and Will be, of immediate benefit to the suppliers of Mid- and South Canterbury as a. whole,” said Mr Clarke. “As proof of this, the Ashburton company had last season paid to those South Canterbury suppliers who supplied the company a higher pay-out a pound of butter-fat than any other South Canterbury dairy company. With _ a larger output this season and the elimination of overlapping cream lorry collection ’ through zoning, last season’s payout will be improved on. “The Ashburton company has had, for some years, 1683 satisfied. suppliers, but there are some South Canterbury suppliers who have just been taken over bv the Ashburton company, and who, in spite of the advantages to be obtained from the Government’s zoning programme, prefer to show extreme resentment to the Ashburton company because it has been entrusted with this important work—a trust which illustrates the confidence that the Commission of Agriculture has in the integrity of the Ashburton company. Mr Burnett’s Complaints

"Instead of making his representations about grading and _ weights _to the Government Dairy Division, which is the proper quarter, Mr Burnett has ventilated the matter in Parliament, where the Ashburton company has not had the privilege of a reply, and, his latest move is to make available for publication the contents of a letter which should have been withheld until the finding of the investigation was available,” continued Mr Clarke. “The Ashburton company _ had no knowledge of these complaints, and in the meantime, until the investigation is made, the company’s honour and integrity are caused to suffer. “The Ashburton company will welcome any investigation, however searching it may be, and, in view _of the attitude that has been adopted, insists that the result of the investigation be made public in fairness to the company. “The standard of cream grading is set and controlled by officers °f J;“ e Dairy Division,” said Mr Clarke. The company’s grader is licensed by the Dairy Division, an 1 is under the supervision of the Dairy Division, and the directors and management of the company have no say in the ot cream, and have not, on any occasion, attempted to interfere with that control. The percentages of grading at the Ashburton factory for October, 1937, were: Finest grade cream Do.lJ per cent., first grade cream 442 per cent, and second grade cream 0.39 per cent. It is admitted that the grading percentages at the Timaru factory, where the set standard is the same as at Ashburton, are not as favourable to South Canterbury suppliers, but this is not the fault of the Ashburton company’s factory at Timaru. We should point out that the staff which graded and handled the Clandeboye suppliers’ cream last season is ing and handling South Canterbury cream at the Timaru factory, the Ashburton company having taken over the Clandeboye staff when it took over the Clandeboye cream. Weighing of Cream “The dissatisfaction over weights no doubt comes from the minority of suppliers, who either estimate their weights on the fullness of the can, which is at the best only a guess, or who weigh their cream on spring-bal-ance scales which are old and strained, and which, I venture to suggest, have not been tested since they were purchased; whereas the dairy company weighs its cream on reputable scales costing between £2OO and £3OO, which are inspected, tested, stamped, and sealed annually by an inspector of weights and measures. “The Ashburton company’s memorandum of association provides that ‘profits of the company shall be divided amongst the suppliers of milk and cream to the company, such suppliers being also shareholders,’ and the number of shares which suppliers are asked to take out is a minimum of five with payment spread over two milking seasons,” continued . Mr Clarke. “This absolves a supplier milking more than five cows from taking one share a cow, as in most cooperative dairy companies. On the other hand, if a differential payment of Id or id a pound on butter-fat in each year as a service charge were adopted, it would be a distinct loss to the supplier for every year that *he remained a non-shareholder, and his loss in the first year would pay for the shares which in his wisdom he should have taken out.”