“Taking Only Due”

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31089, 18 June 1966, Page 1

“Taking Only Due”

“The requirement laid down by the Government was that should farmers give a firm undertaking to subscribe £400,000 within 12 months of allotment the Government, for its part, would be prepared to authorise the use of the Meat Industry Reserve Account to finance the balance of the costs of the works,” said the chairman of the South Island Fertiliser Company, Mr R. H. Kerr, last evening.

“That was the authority on which we operated and it was never altered at any stage throughout our canvass of farmers, in spite of the recommendations of the electoral college of the Meat and Wool Boards.”

Mr Kerr said Mr W. B. Trotter, of South Canterbury, had been responsible for the recommendation to the Electoral College referred- to in Parliament, and it was Mr Trotter’s inference that the farmers’ support would prove the economics of the whole venture. “The fact is that 80 per cent of the farmers in the area, in spite of all opposition, have subscribed to the co-operative fertiliser company,” Mr Kerr said. “The question that farmers

in other parts of New Zealand may be concerned that pool funds are being misused is answered by the fact that there are only 75,000 farmers in New Zealand, and all farmers are not sheepfarmers. Some 2300 have subscribed to this company. The Meat Industry Reserve Account stands at £44m. By simple arithmetic we are only taking out a portion of our due.”

“The present shuffling by the Government I regard as nothing short of ‘welshing.’ Surely this country is entitled to absolute integrity from the Government,” said Mr W. B. Trotter, last night. He said he would like to know if the Dominion Fertiliser Company had been given an assurance that, provided the terms for the release of pool funds to the South Island Co-operative Fertiliser Company were tough enough, the farmers would not play, and it was, therefore, quite safe for the Dominion company to go ahead with the building of a partial works at Seadown. “Is this true?” Mr Trotter

asked? “If it is not, will the Minister of Agriculture (Mr Taiboys) make a public statement and disclose what took place in discussions between the Government and the Dominion Fertiliser Company? In my opinion, the public is entitled to know.”