SHIPS, SHOPS, & "TRUST" METHODS

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 32, 6 August 1921, Page 4

SHIPS, SHOPS, & "TRUST" METHODS

The recent Dominion Conference of the Farmers' Union pronounced against protective Customs duties ; though it did not call £qv tqe repeal of the duties on butter, wheat, and Hour. Farmers', zeal fpr, free markets did not prevent the Cout ference from asking- for an exten^ sion of the moratorium, and a, remit directed against rising interest rates was lost by only two votes. Later in its proceedings the Con^ ference denounced the malevolence of trusts as emphatically as the most advanced Labourite could desire ; affirmed that the slump in meat prices was engineered/by the meat combines; and passed resolutions in favour of establishing (1) a producers' shipping company, (2) a national co-operative marketing scheme for wool, meat, and dairy produce, and (3) retail shops for the sale of meat in England. Pro^ posal No. 3, when cabled to London, was described by Mr. Massey as impracticable; to which Mr. W, J. Poison (Dominion President of the Farmers' Union) replied that the Union was not committed to the shops idea. The underlying principle of the Farmers' Union Conference seems to be co-operaT tive competition in transport and marketing. Co-operation, in competition with private enterprise, is, of course, a Very different thing from nationalisation, which would bo. the underlying principle of a Labour Conference. But if the farmers and .Labour have not developed a common method, they have at any rate found a common enemy ; and even that fact. establishes a sufficient degree of common interest to be of. political importance. Bift for the fortunate decision of the Farmers' Union Conference to abstain • from the formation of a fawners' political party, the materials would have,, been present for one of those "triangular duels" that characterise—and do not improve—Australian politics).

Time j will test whether there is any vitality in this determination to do things better than they are being done by existing private enterprise. From the public point of view it is better that the test should be under conditions of co-operative effort in competition with private enterprise; for if such an effort survive, its survival will prove its fitness, whereas a nationalising effort that is monopolistic in char-1 actei- (e.g., the railways and the, post and telegyaph) represents, merely survival in an artificial, politicalised atmosphere. It is possible to secure a State monopoly of railways in New Zealand, but it is hardly possible to monopolise seaservic,es; hence the establishment and running of a shipping line should be a fairly thorough test* of the efficiency of State control (as in the case of the Commonwealth! line) and of co-operative effort (as, planned by the New Zealand producers). While on this subject it is fair to add that Mr. Lysnar, who, figurgd largely in the co-operative crusade of the Dominion Farmers' Union Conference, attacks the citadel (marketing) rather than !>he. avenues that lead thereto. He says, in effect, that too riiuch blame is be-: | ing attached by farmers to high!

freights! and high freezing charges (about 3d per lb), and that attention should be focussed not on'this threepence but "on the shilling that was lost at the other end " through trusts. Mr. Lysnar also states that the firms he objects to in the. meat trade are operating in dairy prpduce^-the upward trend of which is now the bright spot in the export, outlook—and Mr. T. Moss, who is not of an alarmist frame of mind, is reported as saying, Concerning the trusts:

They offered more than the market value for produce, and; that was the finishing touch. He w,as speaking of his experience with dairy produce. To establish a competitive marketing enterprise, so as to protect an exported commodity from the ship to the consumer, is probably an even bigger undertaking than to establish a shipping line. The alter-, native remains of. connecting up with some ' existing distributive institution in the Old Country, such as those co-operative concerns the growth of which—if it can be consolidated and maintained in lean years as well aq in. fat —constitutes, one of the most striking economic achievements of co-operative enteiv prise.