STATE AS DAIRYMAN

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 151, 23 December 1926, Page 8

STATE AS DAIRYMAN

A CHALLENGE

BUTTER-FAT AT ONE SHILLING

MUNICIPALISATION ABGUMENT

IN MELBOURNE.

Whether the milk supplier is underpaid, whether he is victimised by the "metropolitan milk combine," and whether things would be better under a municipalised milk scheme, are still subjects of argument in Molbourne.

The secretary of a dairymen's association writes to the Press, referring to the fact that "some time ago Dr. Bobertson, then chief of the Government dairy experts, gave out that- ho could produce butter profitably at Is per lb buttor-f at. Emboldened' by this utteranco many would-be experts, mostly city reared, made a hobby of talking such uonsensrf dairymen being accused of bad management,, whereas the trouble lies in the fact that prices for their product aro - too low. My object in writing this is to endeavour to bring the matter, to a head, and I challenge tho Government officials to prove their assertions' by demonstrating what they claim of their methods. My conditions are:—The Government to rent or buy a dairy farm in the Warrnambbol district, and run it for three or five years,. under its methods, keeping a strict account of all income and outlay. As a dairyman, I maintain that under existing prices for butter-fat it cannot be made to pay interest on the money, and a decent wage for the labour engaged In carrying it on, and I may claim that my methods are up to data, seeing that I top-dress, herd-test, breed, and feed for production." According to another critic, "one of ,the mistakes to be avoided by Melbourne milk producers in aiiy discussion of the disabilities of the industry and their remedies is the hasty conclusion that all their troubles will be automatically solved by a municipal monopoly of distribution. In any weighing of the pros and cons of the situation the present system suffers from the fact that under it the man on the farm receives only about one-third of the price paid by the consumer. Not unnaturally it is argued that a_»y system that supersedes the present one must be an improvement so far as the dairy farmer is concerned. Services rendered in distribution would have to carried but and paid for if a municipality or group of municipalities were the distributor. The waste of overlapping' would be avoided, Certainly; but overlapping is the result of competition, which is a powerful factor in promoting efficiency, and, therefore, economy. Moreover, there is no guarantee tha. under municipal enterprise—-even granting that the efficiency of private enterprise were retained while the loss of overlapping were eliminated—tlie consequent savings would go into the pockets of the producers. Employees can cite a monopoly before a sympathetic wage tribunal as easily as they can a number of private employers, and they would seek-—and probably obtain —a substantial share of any savings in distribution costs effected by a municipal monopoly. Consumers, too. would expect cheaper milk from a concern whose aim was not to make profits; and as they would be able to exert pressure upon elected persons their expectations would probably not be in vain. In any case, they would object to pay a higher price for better milk. It is admittedly anomalous than the driver of a milkcart, with no capital outlay, and work not so arduous as that, of the farmer, should be-receiving more out of the milk business than many small farmers; but municipal control is not necessarily tho solution."•.. The lesson to be learned by producers is that whatever modifications are made in the system of distribution they must stand'unitedly in defence of their own interests." The following resolution was passed unanimously at meetings of'dairy farmers from the Narro Warren, Hallam, Berwick, Beaconsfield, Clayton, Mnlgravo, Dandenong, Keysborough, Lower Ferntree Gully, Wheeler's Hill, Boronia, Scoresby, Cranbourne, Clyde, Koo-wee-rup, and Lyndhurst districts:—"That in the opinion of this meeting of dairy farmers if is high time that we organised to protect ourselves against the exploitation of the Melbourne milk combine, and we desire to make emphatic protest to our members of Parliament, and request that they/give no further support to the Allan-Peacock Government, which has failed to help us get relief from the stranglehold of the combine. We further unanimously agree to invite Mr. H. Glowrey, of the Primary Producers' Association, to address meetings and formulate proposals with a view to a complete organisation of the dairying industry in' Victoria.