IMPERIAL WOOL PURCHASE.

Evening Post, Volume XCVI, Issue 12, 13 July 1918, Page 11

IMPERIAL WOOL PURCHASE.

♦— —. . SOUTHERN HAWKES BAY FARMERS' PROTEST. (»T lELKGRAPH,—PKIiSS ASSOCIATION.) DANNEVIHKE, 12th July. Mr. W. D. Lysnar, of Gisborne, addressed a largely-attended meeting of farmers of Southern Hawkes Bay Upon the Imperial.wtiolpurchase, setting forth the grounds 01, his opposition to commandeer extending longer' than three months after the war. He 6aid that the shortage of shipping was not'likely to affect, the position after the war, because Sir Joseph Ward had stated in the House that all the New Zealand troops would be returned within twelve months of its- close. The ships bringing the troops would be available to lift the wool. Replying to the argument that South Africa had suffered by depending on the open market, Mr. Lysnar said that country, although the-clip showed a shrinkage, of 28,000,0001b, last year, as compared, with 1915, -had profited by £4,226,000. ■ A motion was unanimously carried voicing an emphatic protest against the manufacturers in England being ' allowed to make high prices out of the Dominion's surplus, wool, which was being sold for civilian requirements to the trade at practically cost price, and much below the actual value. The remainder of the resolution was in similar terms to that carried at the meeting of Gisborne wcol-growers. ■ Replying to a vote of thanks, Mr. Lysnar said he felt that he would be a public coward if he did not expose the effecte that were likely to accrue to the pastoral industry of New Zealand from the terms of the Imperial purchase, if it extended beyond three months of the close of the war/