THE BACKBONE

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 89, 14 April 1923, Page 6

THE BACKBONE

In another part of this issue will be found an article written by a farin&r, 'and, no doubt, expressing iyhat many farmers think and feel when vis-a-vis, those whose means of livelihood are not directly derived from the land. The writer, who uses, the pen-name of " Colonus," has had the advantage, that many farmers never had, of a business training; but, as will b» seen, he takes the familiar myopic view of everything else but farming and the farmer. No industry in New Zealand, ho holds, stands upon a sound economic basis. "All, except farming, are bolstered up by some artificial Governmentmade regulation, and will surely collapse at the first crisis; while farming, crushed by the loads imposed upon it, is not a payable proposition." The moratoria are described as destructive of the sanctity of contract; special privileges have been conferred "by the Government, at the public expense, on returned soldiers and others; "practically all industries in New Zealand, except agriculture, are pampered under the warm shelter of the Customs Tariff"; trades unions are supported by " a vicious system of combines " ; railways are being built on an ." uneconomic basis "; economy in the administration of public affairs is " thrown to the winds " ; added to the burdens of the industrious "is a monstrous Civil Service, notoriously over-staffed and inefficient"; " finally, at the bottom of all the accumulated loads, is the broad back of the farmer, the only considerable member of the community who earns his living, who works on a natural and economic level." The only remedy for all these grievances (and more also) that suggests itself to " Colonus " is to " earn much and spend less."

The farmer has been told often that he is, " the backbone; of the country." He believes it. So h© is, for if he falls everyone in the country suffers; if he rises, everyone indirectly benefits. But what he is so apt to forget is the simple physiological fact that the spinal column is not all that constitutes a vertebrate. There are the limbs, and their useful extremities; there are the muscular, nervous, circulatory, digestive, and other systems ; there are the sensatory organs; there is the brain. The myopia of the farmer of the type represented by " Colonus " is shown in his inability to appreciate his helplessness if left single-handed. True, he can feed himself; but if he wishes to do more than merely live he has to summon to his aid "the parasites," as they have frequently been called by short-sighted farmers, to carry his produce, and load it into trains and shfps; to finance, store, sell, and handle that produce; to carry his mails and transmit his telegrams; to instruct him in the best and most efficient ways of farming; to keep him informed of current conunei-cial and other intelligence; to educate his children; to help feed, and clothe, amuse and entertain him; even to administer to his spiritual necessities —if he feels'he has any. " Colonus " is'particularly severe upon the Civil Service. It is, he says, notoriously over-staffed and inefficient. This is a gratuitously unfair statement. It is far too sweeping, for in the Department of Agriculture and its many activities alone the farmer's _ interests are made the sole study* of as highly a trained body, of, specialists &b is

possible for the Government to provide.

With regard to special privileges for " some at the expense of the rest of the community," of which " Colonus," as a representative farmer,, complains, he appears to have forgotten the special privilege to farmers of the embargo on imports of flour and wheat; he has not made himself familiar with the items in the Tariff specially protecting primary producers from competition from without; and he has omitted to account for the enormous amount of legislation placed on the Statute Books of this Dominion in the special interests! of producers. He has also forgotten, as so many farmers seem to do, but as no business man should, that the backbone is not the sole constituent of the corpus. What is wanted, more to-day than ever before, is a better understanding' between town and country, more consideration the one for the other, wider and longer vision on the part of each of them. Honesty, industry, enterprise, are not the monopoly of any one class in New Zealand. They are not confined to farmers, nor wholly wanting in the ' Civil Service, as so many farmer critics appear to be convinced. It is not the inducement, much*less the increase, of friction between town and country, or clasß and class, but its reduction, that is so important in New Zealand to-day. The call ia for the oil-can, not for emery powder. More lubricity in the relations of the various interests that have to meet in this Dominion, a greater degree of reasonableness, much more sympathy, and certainly more knowledge of the conditions^ work and service performed by the farmers, and of all those who follow other callings, would achieve wonders in the development of this highly-favoured land, and greatly add to the happiness of all who live in it. A little more politeness, too, would be profitably expended.