MEAT INDUSTRY INQUIRY

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28742, 13 November 1958, Page 16

MEAT INDUSTRY INQUIRY

Commission’s Order Of Reference

(New Zealand Press Association)

WELLINGTON, November 12.

A commission to investigate the meat industry in New Zealand has been set up by the Government. Mr D. M. Greig, formerly Director-General of Lands, will be chairman, and the members will be Mr C. G. Cran, property supervisor, of Christchurch, Mr L. C. Scott, formerly advisory officer of the Department of Agriculture, Wellington, and Mr H. W. Youren, a sheepfarmer, of Napier. The secretary will be Mr J. H. Coulam, of the Department of Agriculture. Announcing this today, the Minister of Agriculture (Mr Skinner) said that the need for such a commission had been apparent in recent years and its findings would assist the Government considerably in reaching decisions on the controversial issues involved.

He said the order of reference for the commission was:

1. The desirability of permitting the export from New Zealand of meat from stock slaughtered in .registered abattoirs.

2. The necessity for periodical investigations by the Minister of Agriculture of the financial operations of meat-export slaughterhouses and the nature and scope of such investigations. . 3. The desirability of meatexport slaughterhouses retailing meat in New Zealand for human consumption. 4. The efficacy of the Meat Act’s provision relating to the export of meat and the desirability of extending these provisions so that hides, pelts, and wool handled in any meatexport slaughterhouses shall, if the owner of such stock requires. be exported on his behalf on the same conditions and for the same considerations now applied to meat. 5. The desirability of empowering local authorities to delegate, with the approval of the Minister of Agriculture, the power of establishing or maintaining abattoirs. 6. Such other matters which may come to the notice of the commission in the course of its inquiries and which it con-

sidcrs should, in the public interest. be investigated. Mr Skinner said the commission would first call for written evidence from the parties concerned. Later, no doubt, it would ask the organisations concerned to amplify their submissions.