State Control Of Farm Produce

Dominion, Volume 31, Issue 269, 10 August 1938, Page 13

State Control Of Farm Produce

Sir, —At a meeting #f fruitgrowers recently a deputation was sent to Mr. Nash to discuss the internal marketing price of fruit, and from the subsequent discussion it appears that they wish to control the export prices. It’seems incredible that there are growers of produce who do not understand that one of the chief policies of the Labour Government is the complete control of all produce, including its production and distribution I If the Labour Party goes back into power after the elections, State control will rule supreme, and whether the produce be butter, cheese, fruit, wool or hides, the State will control the production and the selling. Mr. Savage has stated that he does not intend to take the farms away from the farmers, but there are methods of control other than confiscating the land. A farmer who is taxed and taxed until he gets no more for his work than his farm hands is virtually a State employee, and it is through methods such as these that, the Labour Government intends to control the land and the farmers. Recently the newspapers informed us that Mr. Nash had sold a quantity of New Zealand potatoes, but that the price and the destination were not to be divulged I Why the secrecy is rather difficult to understand, but it must give the fruit farmers food for thought. Mr. Nash must have had a good laugh to himself at the idea of fruit-growers thinking they would have any say in the export prices, or even the destination of their fruit, while the Labour Party is in power!—l am, etc.. POTATOES. Hawke’s Bay, August 8.