Wool Board wins “vote of confidence”

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32565, 26 March 1971, Page 2

Wool Board wins “vote of confidence”

(Neto Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, March 25. A motion of no confidence in the “present activities” of the Wool Board was heavily defeated at the mid-year meeting of the electoral committee of the board today.

The mover of the motion, Mr D. M. Land, of Hawke’s Bay, and the seconder, Mr A. J. MacDonald, of Waikato, were the only members of the committee who spoke for the motion during the debate.

But some speakers who opposed it indicated that there were aspects of the board’s work with which growers were not satisfied. This is believed to be the first time that a motion of no confidence in either the Wool Board or the Meat Board has come before the committee. Declaring the motion lost by an overwhelming majority, the chairman of the committee (Mr F. E. Humphreys, of Gisborne), said he took the vote as a vote of confidence in the board. It was an informed vote taken after members had heard the addresses of the chairman of the board (Sir John Acland) and the managing director of the International Wool Secretariat (Mr A. C. B. Maiden), he said. Mr Land, who has been referred to as one of the “Young Turks” of the electorial committee, said the motion was not bom from

panic, but from frustration. Some growers did not feel their interests were safeguarded by the marketing system.

“We were told the board would produce something on marketing by last Christmas, and all it did was introduce another investigation project,” he said. “If that is not

frustrating, I don’t know what is. In the past some of us have tried to put constructive ideas before the board, but the board is not easy to approach.” Mr Land said wool prices to the grower were low, hut the price of the finished product had been rising rapidly. The board had been given ample time to move on marketing. It would have to regenerate its thinking and get confidence back into the industry.

Mr MacDonald said growers had been waiting in vain for a wool marketing policy from the board. “Evaluation, and yet more evaluation, is no good while the growers are sinking down,” he said. Opposing the motion, Mr G. Wilson, of Hawke’s Bay, said it was not constructive. He did not think the resolution would have been moved if the price of wool had been 50c a pound. “Our basic problem is that buyers will not pay as much as we would like for our wool,” Mr Wilson said. “We cannot blame the board for for that, and this motion will not engender any confidence in the industry. I submit it was conceived in discontent and bom out of panic and fear.”

Mr B. Dryden, of Waverley, expressed opposition to the motion, but said he did not criticise the men who had brought it forward. “If this is an opinion widely held among growers, they had a duty to do so,” he said. “The board is now approaching a time when it must demonstrate its leadership. It is near the time when it must make a decision on certain aspects of marketing.” Earlier at the meeting, Mr W. S. Johnston, of Gore, said the board expected growers to shed too many tears over the decline of the auction system. “Growers want to sell their wool on the best market,” said Mr Johnston.