N.Z. PRIMARY EXPORTS

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25902, 7 September 1949, Page 6

N.Z. PRIMARY EXPORTS

OPINIONS OF MR W. H. GILLESPIE (From Our Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON. September 6. It was unwise of the Government not to have made any prevision for a rainy day, particularly to cushion the effects of a fall in prices for meat and wool, said Mr W. H. Gillespie (Opposition. Hurunui). speaking in the House of Representatives yesterday. New Zealand had done herself and Britain a disservice by accepting prices lower than other countries received for primary produce. Higher prices for New Zealand production would have enabled Britain to export more and New Zealand’s standard of living would have been raised as a consequence. “We are skating on very thin ice,” said Mr Gillespie. Under the arrangement with Britain prices could fluctuate in the meat industry by 71 per cent. Meat prices themselves were largely influenced by wool prices, and he wondered what the effect would be on New Zealand’s economy if wool prices were to fall by 50 per cent, from their present very high level. The Government had claimed that there was £44.000.000 worth of reserves in the stabilisation funds to meet such a contingency, but he feared that that money in the main had been already spent. Mr Gillespie claimed that high taxation was removing the incentive for farmers. One man he knew whose income had risen to £l2OO a month found that in the long run he was making no more than a neighbour who had not bothered at all to increase production by scientific means and good use of machinery.